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LOVE 

KNOWS NO LAW 



LEON DE TINSEAU 


TRANSLATED BY CAMDEN CURWEN 



ILLUSTRATED 


NEW YORK 

WORTHINGTON COMPANY 
747 Broadway 
1892 


Copyright, 1892, by 

WORTHINGTON CO. 


Love Knows No Law. 


1 . 

For the third time since leaving Montreal, the 
passengers on a westward-bound train beheld the 
light of a new day from the windows of their enor- 
mous rolling dormitory. For the third time the 
parching rays of a July sun fell obliquely on the 
corridor-on-wheels in which the passengers of the 
Canadian Pacific were forced to kill so many hours 
looking out on some of the most monotonous, and 
some of the most picturesque, scenes the wide world 
can show. 

Just at present the view was tame and dreary 
enough, the heat and dust sufficiently oppressive 
to warrant the air of profound lassitude with which 
a certain young tourist, turning his back to the 
engine, leant languidly backward and contemplated 
the wide miles of disappearing country flying rear- 
ward. Our lonely traveller, incredible as it may 
seem, thus lost and isolated in mid-Canada, about 
half way between the Pacific and Atlantic, by every 
outward sign and semblance belonged to the most 
characteristic section of Parisian youth. 


4 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Indeed if he had suddenly put in an appearance 
at Dieppe or Trouville, without the alteration of a 
single item in his dress, not a French promenader 
would have doubted for a moment that he had 
steamed out of the depot Saint- Lazare four hours 
earlier. He was irreproachably costumed in mouse- 
colored flannel, silk stockings, polished ankle-shoes, 
necktie of peacock blue, and wide-brimmed straw 
hat surrounded with fantastically-blazoned ribbon 
of white watered silk. Those who are well in- 
formed in latter-day fashions will be able to estab- 
lish from these details the date of the opening of 
our veracious history, which is too recent to need 
more conventional specification. 

To sum up the portraiture of the young traveller, 
let us say that he was exceedingly well favored, 
although one might regret that nature had not 
given him another inch or two of stature. To say 
that his face wore an intelligent outlook is to add 
but little, for all Parisians of a certain clique are 
gifted thus, just as the members of a different set 
look unmistakably rich. His hair and mustache 
were of that happily-blended tint that, in the eyes 
of blondes, has all the attractions of a dark complex- 
ion, and, in the favor of brunettes, the fascination 
of old-gold. For the rest, we may aver that, men- 
tally as well as physically, our traveller represented 
a felicitous medium between the defects and vir- 
tues, the inconveniences and advantages of his day 
and generation. 

Nevertheless, through the mere fact of his pres- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


5 


ence near the hundredth degree of longitude west, 
the young Viscount Alain de Lavandien rose above 
the million. It seems apparent that, before another 
twenty years have flown, our nation will have 
pushed the craze for “globe-trotting” to lengths not 
previously anticipated. But to-day if you encoun- 
ter a young Frenchman, travelling for pleasure, 
half-way to the Antipodes, you may safely conclude 
that he is not the first of his set that has made the 
journey. And, from all appearances, one thus 
carefully and fashionably dressed would not be 
taken for a man in lowly search of fortune. 

Let us remark that it is possible to travel for 
amusement and yet not find the faintest pleasure 
in the operation. One thing the viscount had ex- 
perienced : that, during three days and nights, he 
had had time and opportunity to have forgotten the 
fact that he was gifted with a tongue. He did not 
understand a syllable of English, and his travelling 
companions had the bad taste to use that idiom. 
And what companions ! 

Turning round, he could see numbers of them 
sprawling on the seats of the smoking-car. They 
seemed to smoke all day. Others occasionally 
passed him, in shirt and pants, cumbered with soap 
and towel, on their way to the lavatory. The dress 
of the majority, recently purchased in Ottawa or 
Montreal, was of a character to weigh upon the 
nerves of a Parisian heavily, as well from cut as 
color. That of others, having lost all semblance 
both of cut and color through long wear, bore un- 


6 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


mistakable traces of the geologic products of the 
Great North West. For the most part, their linen 
was prudently concealed, save in the case of a 
clergyman in immaculate stand-up collar — one of a 
class who possess the art of travelling from pole to 
pole without a speck of dust upon their clothes, or 
a wrinkle on their faces or shirt-fronts. 

Very many of these rough travellers were of co- 
lossal stature, and, by their simple contiguity, 
seemed to reduce the viscount’s size to Lilliputian 
proportions. At the same time, by reason of their 
outrageous foot-wear, formidable brogans, worn-out 
canvas shoes, soiled and embroidered slippers, in- 
congruous products of the country Crispins of every 
quarter of the globe, they irritated the young aristo- 
crat contemplating his own irreproachable shoes, and 
were classed by him, in sarcastic silence, as barba- 
rians pure and simple. If they would only have 
kept their feet to themselves, in the direction pro- 
priety dictates ! So far from that, De Lavandien, 
opening his eyes after a disturbed siesta, had more 
than once discovered a pair of boots, inhabited, an 
inch or two each side of his exclusive cheeks, in 
one case touching them. They belonged to the 
traveller on the seat behind him, thus making him- 
self comfortable at other people’s cost, provok- 
ing, reckless shoulder-shrugs and desperate roll- 
ings of the eye, which in his own particular set 
would have cost the outraged viscount half a dozen 
duels. But few indeed of these agricultural giants 
seemed to be aware of the Parisian’s presence, let 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW, 


7 


alone disquiet themselves in regard to what he 
thought or did not think. And as the need for 
sympathy is probably at bottom the strongest 
characteristic of the Gallic race, Alain, it must be 
confessed, was beyond doubt already homesick. 

To tell the truth, many another in his position 
would have felt the same. If he turned toward the 
oncoming horizon, the thin bright lines of steel 
were lost to sight in one converging streak ; if to 
the disappearing acres he had traversed, the same 
monotonous effect appeared from the windows of his 
Pullman car. At first distinct and separately pol- 
ished, the two metallic ribbons gradually coalesced 
and were at last confounded in one inflexible, inex- 
orably-straight line, which cut the visible Cana- 
dian prairies in half with geometrical precision. 
Not one little knoll or gentle valley lent attraction 
to the tired eye. Nothing to be seen save in the 
distance a small black spot that denoted the most 
recent of their halting-places, a depot long since 
left behind. 

Impossible to paint the impress of solitude and 
forsakenness that marked this desert without boun- 
dary or end, where the sand of the Sahara is re- 
placed by a tough and stubbly grass with blades 
an inch in width, already by the torrid sunshine 
robbed of its attractive graceful green ! This harsh 
earth-covering resembles the juicy emerald carpet 
ef our Normandy pasture-fields as the reed jacket 
manufactured by a savage resembles the velvet 
mantle woven for a queen. 


8 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Nevertlieless, where the lines of earth and sky 
commingled in the golden haze of the midsummer 
morning, a vague appearance made one guess the 
presence of the outskirts of a mighty forest. But 
our young Parisian was no longer deceived. Since 
the preceding evening, toward sunset, he had been 
the victim of the same illusion, the lying promises 
of the mirage. Yet he was hardly able to keep his 
gaze from straying from this fantastic forest, save 
to retrace the intersecting strip of steel that 
stretched its polished length into the azure east. 

In the midst of such vague reveries and unsatis- 
fying visions, the young man suddenly started. 
The gray-uniformed darkey charged with the ser- 
vice of his sleeping-car, had tapped him on the 
shoulder, saying: 

“Beausejour next, sah.” 

For this depot of Beausejour, during seventy 
weary hours, had the patient De Lavandien waited. 
At last he would soon be able once again to talk in 
his beloved mother tongue, unless he had forgotten 
it, and look on a familiar face. He threads the 
smoking-car, and enters the enormous common 
dormitory, which, as though by enchantment, had 
already changed its nightly visage ; the make-shift 
couches and bed-coverings have disappeared. Next 
he verifies his various articles of baggage, puts a 
silver dollar in the darkey’s palm, and on the plat- 
form awaits the stopping of the train. The pro- 
digious iron serpent, two hundred yards from end to 
end, under the irresistible traction of the vacuum- 


LOVE Knows no law. 


9 


brake, shrieks and trembles and struggles down to 
a snail’s pace, destined not to come to final stand- 
still till, two dreary days ahead, it finds a resting- 
place by the Pacific, on the Vancouver quay. As 
soon as the wheels were still, our traveller leaped 
down upon the prairie. Not a trace to be seen, not 
a vestige of a platform, let alone the customary ad- 
juncts of a depot. Worse than all, not a trace of 
the carriage and pair destined to waft him, bag and 
baggage, to the farm he was about to honor with 
his promised visit. 

“ I think I must have got off on the wrong side 
of the train,” he soliloquized. As soon as the- cars 
draw out I shall behold the station, and, which con- 
cerns me even more, my friend Maurice de Cle- 
guerec in waiting with his turn-out.” 

Notwithstanding this supposition, the baggage 
wagon in front vomited the viscount’s impedimenta 
on the same side of the way. The operation was 
performed with true American celerity. Then with- 
out a word of warning, bell, or whistle, the huge 
monster that carried so many people to their va- 
rious destinations drew off in solemn, almost surly 
silence, leaving, in token of its passage, a solitary 
passenger broken-heartedly returning the civil 
hand-waves of the cheerful colored guard. 

Not an obstacle now stood between our Parisian , 
and a fuller if not more satisfactory view of the 
illimitable prairie. In vain, however, he searched 
for any trace of human habitation. Prairie, and 
prairie only, deserted, taciturn, not actually quite 


lO 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


as flat as it had seemed before, because he saw it 
now from the level of the earth. A paltry eleva- 
tion a few feet in height blocked out a part of 
the horizon some half a league or so to the north. 
Everywhere else the infinite flat country stretched 
without betraying the existence of a shanty. 

“Some terrible mistake,’* groaned De Lavandien 
with a hearty shiver. 

Then he began to hallo at the top of his voice, 
as people in distress do in the bush, although the 
train was almost out of sight, a tawny spot half lost 
in silver vapor each moment growing smaller to 
the view. 

Suddenly the traveller beheld a rickety post, 
bearing a time-worn board with the inscription: 
“ Beausejour.” This post, this sign, a folded red 
flag lying on the grass, waved by rare travellers 
anxious to board a passing train, were the sole 
signs of this putative station. Alain opined they 
formed, perhaps, sufficient preparation for the part- 
ing guest, inadequate accommodation for a new 
arrival. Fortunately the day was radiantly fine — 
too radiant, in fact, for the sun seemed ambitious 
to set the prairie on fire, although, as yet, it was 
hardly 8 o’clock in the morning. 

lu accordance with inevitable custom, our ship- 
wrecked mariner of a novel kind began to take an 
inventory of his flotsam and jetsom — in a word, his 
baggage. Not an article was missing — an imposing 
covered basket that contained his shirts, whose 
gloss vied with the brightest porcelain from Sat- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


II 


suma, leather portmanteau for occasional outings, 
portable trunk of statuettes and bric-a-brac, case of 
breechloading gun and rifle, roll of overcoats, rugs, 
walking-sticks and umbrellas, hat-box, and grip- 
sack for a pair of slippers, brushes, and a night- 
gown — one and all were there, save for a conspicu- 
ous film of desert dust, as safe and sound as when 
he had steamed out of Paris. Never, since the day 
when it emerged in all its brilliant youth from the 
Creator’s fashioning hand, had the prairie borne a 
similar encumbrance of magnificent baggage. 

The inventory taken, our Parisian Robinson Cru- 
soe took a temporary seat on his valise, and taking 
out and opening a blue umbrella, reflected that at 
any rate the westward train would pass the same 
time on the morrow, while that returning east 
would hardly, without a special miracle, go by the 
post of Beausejour until near nightfall. 

“Yonder monkey, Cleguerec, by all that’s sacred, 
should have been here to welcome me. Sacre! am 
I mistaken in the date? ” 

Fumbling in his pockets he drew out a letter he 
had received from Maurice, in New York. It was 
indeed that very day, at the hour when the train for 
Vancouver was due (there was but one a day) that 
his entertainer had promised to receive him “at 
Beausejour depot!” — in order to drive him home to 
“ The Hermitage,” for so his settlement was called. 

“Where on earth w‘The Hermitage?’ ” asked he 
anew. “ Probably behind that little reach of rising 
ground. Let me make a voyage of discovery to 


12 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


find out what’s upon the farther side. True, it is 
broiling hot, the way is long, and I cannot make 
the company ‘responsible’ for my baggage by de- 
positing it in the Left Parcels Office; but I must 
venture, all the same.” 

Not only was it hot, but he was somewhat hun- 
gry, and particularly thirsty. . . . After all, Mau- 
rice’s letter was eight days old, more than time 
enough to allow of one’s dying of hunger or being 
led into captivity by painted savages. Still 

Still seated in the soothing shade of his blue par- 
asol, poor Alain thought and thought what he had 
better do, as if the embarrassment of several alter- 
natives were his. Already the counties native pop- 
ulation of prairie-dogs, inoffensive creatures, half 
rat, half rabbit, had emerged from the holes to 
which the passing train had sent them scuttling, 
and were considering the new arrival with a curi- 
osity not altogether rude. On the other hand, the 
viscount gave thern scant attention. He was un- 
able to remove his fascinated eyes from the gleam- 
ing double train-track, fringed on either side by a 
heterogeneous litter such as passengers and rail- 
way cooks throw overboard — smashed dishes, empty 
bottles, jars that once had held preserves and 
pickles, and fhe inevitable milk-can, with its vari- 
ety of labels. Overhead stretched the iron thread, 
mysterious telegraphic link, one end of which 
touched Paris, darling Paris ! But for many a com- 
ing hour these two elements of modern civilization, 
steam and electricity, would be entirely useless to 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


13 


him — -useless as to the tiny four-legged philosophers 
now gambolling in the burning grass. 

Suddenly the viscount’s face, overclouded with 
anxiety for the half hour past, cleared up anew. A 
genuine thought illumined his darkened mind, a 
name rose to his lips. 

“ Dear Simone — could you see me now!'* 

He was upon the point of smiling, but ere the 
smile had fairly dawned, it died. 

“No doubt at all I’m a most ridiculous object, 
and Simone would fairly laugh herself into hyster- 
ics if she set eyes upon me now.” 

And then, still screened by that blue umbrella, he 
wondered whether the situation was more character- 
ized by the sublime or the ridiculous. Analyzing 
thus the strong and weak points of his potential hero- 
ism, his left hand, from his low seat, had mechani- 
cally glided to one of his aforesaid ankle-shoes, 
whose raven polish, contrary to all established laws 
of physics, seemed to have contracted and to be 
contracting momently beneath the fiery sunshine. 

An oath, subdued and semi-gentle, rose for utter- 
ance. Let us hope the viscount merely anathema- 
tized his shoemaker. 


II. 


At this moment a tiny speck became apparent on 
the crest that closed the north horizon. Rapidly ap- 
proaching, it grew larger as it advanced, and soon 
the viscount could distinguish a one-horse vehicle, 
then that it was tenanted by somebody. It was 
a country cross between a tilbury and buggy. At 
a quarter of a mile off it looked no larger than one 
of those flimsy microscopic chariots whose slender 
wheels cause the dust to fly in hippodromes on rac- 
ing-days. 

Arriving at the iron road, the buggy stopped. 
The youthful driver sprang to earth with wonder- 
ful agility. Two seconds afterward the spanking 
bay was hitched to a telegraph post. Then Mau- 
rice de Cleguerac marched up with hands extended 
to his visitor, who stood regarding him with a mix- 
ture of surprise and admiration. 

Indeed, the newcomer seemed bubbling over 
with health and animal spirits. But wedded to this 
health appeared the nervous slimness often seen in 
those whose energy is overflowing. This kind of 
figure made him seem taller than he really was, 
and not so old. Nobody would have imagined he 
was very nearly thirty. Without having masculine 
“beauty” in the “professional” degree (a less de- 
14 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


15 


sirable possession in the sterner sex) he was un- 
commonly handsome. His wavy chestnut hair, 
pronounced and rounded chin, and well-shaped, un- 
disfigured mouth, whose mobile lips were sentient 
with thought, every careless line and grace about 
him, to the great straw hat thrown jauntily upon 
his curls, caused one to think of some adventurous, 
forceful cavalier by Velasquez, whose outward calm 
but masks the inner fires of ambition. This Bre- 
ton with the Spanish eyes must have certainly 
sprung from Celtic stock, mysteriously grafted to 
Iberian ancestry in some nebulous and prehistoric 
natural migration. 

“ Do forgive me for keeping you waiting,” said 
the Parisian’s host. “ It all happened through An- 
nie. She got up and got out this morning without 
my leave ; and when it became necessary to har- 
ness not a horse was on the premises. You see 
what a large dose of indulgence must be extended 
by the stranger within our gates, bag and bag- 
gage ” 

As he pronounced the word “baggage,” Clegue- 
rac suddenly interrupted himself. The pile of lug- 
gage Viscount de Lavandien had brought along 
with him at that instant forcibly struck his eyes. 

“ The deuce !” cried Cleguerac, twirling his mus- 
tache. 

Alain excused himself, though slightly out of 
countenance. 

“ I think it would have been better had I left my 
larger chest in New York City.” 


i6 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ No, no. It is I that am to blame, for not re- 
flecting that I had a Parisian for my guest, and not 
a mountain scout. What folly that I did not bring 
the ^democrat.’” 

“The ‘democrat,’” repeated Alain, not knowing 
the significance of the word. 

“ We call a ‘democrat’ here what you call an ‘om- 
nibus’ in Europe, or something very like it. But 
do not let us dillydally longer here. Get in.” 

Lavandieu passively obeyed, not daring even to 
hint that any harm or diminution might happen to 
the luckless baggage, let alone that he might never 
see it more. Already he submitted to the steady 
magnetism of Cleguerac’s eyes, in turn instinct with 
the sentiments of an ever-victorious warrior, or 
pregnant with the darkling thought of one who is 
often forced to resign himself to the deep waters 
of fate. As soon as the companions were sardined 
into the very narrow buggy, Maurice shouted : 

“Sit firm, my boy, sit firm! The mare goes 
like the wind at the start.” 

“She hardly looks it,” smiled Lavandien. 

Indeed, with head hung low and limbs a little 
chunky for her slender ribs, tail and mane in the 
state of nature, and pelt reeking with perspiration, 
Annie had more the appearance of a country sur- 
geon’s nag than of a fiery highflyer. However, at 
the first appeal by word of mouth from her master, 
the bay took a formidable bound, making tracks at 
a gallop, rather obliquely, it is true, for the de- 
serted stable. The bumping would have been se- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


17 


vere upon the best of roads, but one might well 
ask how the thick, clumsy wooden wheels resisted 
the unceremonious dance of the vehicle over the 
prairie inequalities. Lavandien kept silence in his 
own despite, although no coward, and pretty well 
acquainted with every danger that a man may in- 
cur, whether on or behind a horse. Deceived by this 
continued dumbness, said Cleguerac: 

“Don’t be alarmed, dear boy. Presently, when 
the remaining two horses come home from the 
plow-tail, we will harness the ‘democrat ’ and go in 
quest of your invaluable traps.” 

“If my ‘invaluable traps’ are where we left 
them,” their owner insinuated, rather gloomily. 

“ Alas, my dear cousin — we are related distantly, 
if memory still holds her seat — would to heaven 
that this country was sufficiently thickly populated 
to justify your fears. Within a radius of half a 
dozen miles, I have one single neighbor, a very 
worthy man, whose house you shall presently see.” 

“And a depot was — built — for two inhabitants!” 

“I might answer that the superfine quality of 
these inhabitants makes up for their scarcity. And 
that the expenses of station, so far, have not ex- 
actly bankrupted the Canada Pacific, I think you 
must admit. But, with the months will come a 
population ; and, for all one knows, I may at this 
very moment be driving one of our future units.” 

“You hardly anticipated the possibility of a visit 
from me; admit as much.” 

“.No. Since the time in which a young St. 


i8 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Cyrien of iny acquaintance used to meet you every 
day and everywhere, Sundays, and at the dinner- 
table of your friends, I learned you had become, 
almost from the college exit, a regular society man. 
What have you done that forces you for refuge to 
the Great Northwest. Have you, in a mad mo- 
ment, spurred by the thorn of friendship or of 
usury, committed forgery, or, still worse, murder? 
Or, at the least, are you in search of rest from some 
mysterious fever of despair or love?” 

“You do well to laugh, cousin,” said Lavandien. 
“ But wait for my confession.” 

“ The laws of hospitality oblige me to open my 
doors to you without exacting an avowal of your 
crimes. But you have neither the appearance nor 
the get-up, and certainly not the baggage^ of an as- 
sassin or — a failure.” 

“ Thanks for that certificate of meritorious bag- 
gage, friend. At such an hour I understand the 
force of your remark. Be generous in the midst 
of my misfortunes.” 

At the same head-splitting speed they had by 
then reached the apex of the crest which marked, 
it seemed, a smiling valley and toy river; but this 
little stream, which Clegu(^rac had often crossed at 
a bound, sufficed to change the entire aspect of the 
country. The north side of the stream being 
slightly faster than the south, had arranged the 
welcome visual surprise of a series of miniature 
bluffs, on whose banks grew clumps of trees, not 
very large truly, but yet in variety, for many miles 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


19 


around. Thus, winding peacefully on, the course 
of Moose Brook was traceable in a placid dark-green 
ribbon, intersected from reach to reach by micro- 
scopic islands of luxuriant reeds, and even willows. 
On either bank stretched cultivated fields, far as 
the eye could reach. 

“Allow me to point out to you my domain, ‘The 
Hermitage.’ Only a little farther on you will be- 
hold the mansion.” 

And, pointing to a lofty chimney like a gigantic 
stovepipe, he added : 

“ That is my Beetroot-sugar Factory. Now you 
see my horses at work. You have seen nearly all 
there is to see*.” 

Alain, an enthusiastic sportsman, gazed pen- 
sively at the horses who were scoring the fertile 
fields with black furrows innumerable, surrounded 
at long intervals by skeleton palisades. 

“ But where are the buildings?” asked he at last. 
“ I perceive neither sugar refinery, house, nor sta- 
ble — not an erection of the humblest kind.” 

“ And no more do you see a field infirmary, nor 
a hen-house, neither forge nor outhouse,” went on 
Cl^guerac, laughing. “ For pity’s sake, good cous- 
in, have a care my horses do not overhear you. 
They are healthy and contented enough as they 
are.'' 

“ But tell me. What do they eat when snow is on 
the ground ? And that there is no lack of snow for 
four or five months of the year, I am informed.” 

“ They do as their companions have to do in the 


20 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


state of nature. When they are hungry, paw away 
the snow with their hoofs. You go-ahead people 
have been for centuries trying to make the horse 
an insupportable, exacting, morbid, hot-house ani- 
mal; let us say, for the sake of argument, a woman. 
Take up the cudgels, my friend; you are now at 
fountain-head of the school of agricultural science 
of the future.” 

“ That calls itself?” 

“ The Society for Suppressing Exaggerated Civ- 
ilization. If we do not wish the fruit tree to per- 
ish, we must graft a more robust slip where it 
branches. Such is the virile history, in brief, of 
nations.” 

Suddenly the road became so rough that it was 
absolutely necessary to slacken the vehicle. A 
sharp natural declivity led to Moose Brook. At 
the same moment a little wooden hut covered with 
drab paint, of very poor appearance, appeared on 
the opposite crest only a few yards off. Rough 
zigzags, cut and fashioned in the hardened clay, 
served as a tricky approach to the humble terrace, 
flanked by a belvidere or rather tier of posts and 
rough veranda that but ill supported the clumsy 
roof. 

“This is ‘The Hermitage!’” exclaimed Lavan- 
dien, with some suspicion of uneasiness. 

“ No. ’Tis the ‘Gray House, ’ the dwelling of my 
only neighbor,” answered Cleguerac in a low 
voice. 

Saying this, he lifted his hat without looking 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


2 


round. The viscount turned his head toward the 
now receding cottage, and, with a start of surprise, 
met the gaze of a great pair of blue eyes, at once 
analytical and innocent. The eyes were filled with 
heaven’s pure and lovely light. 

What he next beheld after the eyes was an im- 
mense straw hat of country manufacture, orna- 
mented with a fantastic coronet of crushed and 
faded artificial flowers, in a way that spoke vol- 
umes for the toughness that had enabled them to 
grow so old without dispetalment. But one forgot 
the hat to see the cataract of silky flax-gold tresses 
that twisted and fell with an admirable irregularity 
a couple of feet or more below it, rolling an ava- 
lanche of lovely locks over its wearer’s shoulders, 
and even encroaching on her eyebrows in high dis- 
dain of any other feature. 

The unknown, whose head of hair had been the 
envy of an empress, to all appearance did not own 
a looking-glass to set her locks in decent order. 
But this fawn-like untidiness possessed such subtle 
magnetism that one naturally wished to know 
whether the young lady’s toilet errors sprang from 
innocence or coquetry. 

Another question that immediately arose was, 
How old is this extraordinary girl? For her figure, 
already magnificently formed, showed that she had 
long ago paid her adieux to childhood ; while her 
dress, of faded tartan plaid, not otherwise unbe- 
coming, showed quite a liberal allowance of ankle. 
The development of this living enigma bespoke a 


22 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


woman of twenty, her dress a girl of twelve. But 
the eyes, those stars of woman’s face, showed no 
more signs of age than the bright stars which hang 
in everlasting youth forever virgin in the sky. 

“In addition to your virtuous, if only crony, it 
seems you have a lady neighbor of magnificent 
loveliness,” exclaimed the. viscount, who had no- 
ticed nothing but the young girl’s bust and eyes 
and gleaming flood of hair. 

“The very idea! She always seems to me no 
more a woman than some apprentice circus acro- 
bat,” protested Maurice warmly, who had only 
taken notice of the scanty skirt. 

This unfortunate article had been a flxed friend 
of his, or nearly so, for now four years. Once or 
twice, it is true, the robe had seemed to suddenly 
grow longer; then, by slow degrees, to take its 
former resting-place above the shoes. But, since 
the preceding winter, it had proved impossible to 
stretch the dress anew, and Cleguerac, absorbed in 
agricultural and industrial problems, had really 
hardly asked himself the reason why. 

“ Little did I think to come across a censor so 
severe in the desert!” cried Alain with a careless 
laugh. “ To-day you’re not a whit more gallant than 
your neighbor. What, not one word of greeting?” 

“Seldom. Besides, her father is a German.” 

“The deuce! You stand no chance, then. The 
very thought of having but one neighbor, and hav- 
ing the misfortune to stumble on a German!” 

“Well, here’s ^The Hermitage,’” announced 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


23 


C16gu^rac, indicating, half a league off in the val- 
ley, a habitation of a far more comfortable aspect. 

“Aha! cousin, you ape the French pavilion as 
though you were an ambassador in exile.” 

“I’m no ambassador, but for all, servant, help, or 
chamberlain,! own a battered mariner who has a pas- 
sion for bunting. On Sundays and high holidays 
we hoist our several flags shy-high. Your arrival 
is most certainly a feast-day; let Rabat have the 
credit of the colors.” 

The friends were now at their destination. In 
little more than half an hour the breathed and 
heated nag had traversed a good seven miles, all in 
the stride, save that she had turned once slightly 
mit of the road to take a drink at a small pool with- 
out leave asked or given — a breach of equine eti- 
quette that had sorely scandalized Lavandien, a 
sportsman of the regulation school. Hardly less 
overcome was he when Maurice proceeded to un- 
harness the perspiring steed himself, leaving her 
instantly to graze the neighboring grass at her own 
sweet will. 

At the same moment, Rabat put in an appear- 
ance with the well-known call: “ Breakfast’s ready, 
gentlemen.” 

Outside of horses and all that appertains in any 
shape or form to horses, Rabat could turn his hand 
to anything, from shaking up a mattress to a pan- 
cake. But his pet vanities concentrated round two 
widely different talents: one was to be able to 
enumerate and describe more clearly than any one 


24 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


else the different parts and functions of maritime 
fortresses ; the other was to be able to cook ham in 
twenty different ways, all equally tasty and diges- 
tible. 

With such menus as Rabat could get up, composed 
of prairie chicken, omelettes, and ham in half a 
dozen indistinguishable styles, it was not as a theo- 
retic gunner that the old salt proved of the greatest 
service in his present place. 

For beverages the comrades had their choice of 
spring-water and cafi-au-lait, the last the natural 
drink of the Canadian. Maurice did the honors of 
his house and table with all his old-time grace and 
cordiality. 

“ I do not blush to set before you what I do, ’* 
said the host, “ because I give you all I have. And 
then you know under whose roof you are : a man 
seeking ever profitable ends, which I decline to 
pay too much for. Certes, my life is rude, labo- 
rious, but it has its fascinations. Were it not for 
the isolation ” 

“ Who or what prevents you ending it? ” 

“Through the gangway of marriage? Cousin, 
the idea of bringing a real woman, let alone a lady, 
here! The problem is a risky one, to say the least 
of it.” 

“You find it so?” said Alain, who seemed much 
struck with the objection. 

“Assuredly. For a ma'rriage to prove a moder- 
ate success under such adverse conditions, it would 
need the wife to be a prodigy, the husband perfect. 


LOVE Enows No law. 


25 


Leaving out of the question the necessity of hunting 
for a prodigy, let us come to the question of my 
own perfection. But I imagine that you hardly 
think me so,” cried Cleguerac with a merry laugh. 
“Your parents should have cited my example as an 
example not to follow. Indeed, I have to ask my- 
self how it came about that they permitted you to 
pay a visit to such a very ill-conducted cousin.” 

“ Well, I must tell you one thing,” said the young 
Frenchman with some embarrassment. “My father 
thinks me still in New York ; and, you may be sure, 
it was not he that counselled me to call at ‘The 
Hermitage.’ But, during my three tedious days’ 
transit, not to speak of the still more tedious nights, 
r often asked myself how it came about you left the 
service to become a mid-Canadian colonist.” 

“ If you put the question to me, it is my duty to 
myself to answer it ; and, if you ask me, I am far 
from whining that I am forgotten. Have no fear 
of my history proving long or tedious, however 
painful it may be. You shall not have to blush for 
your relation.” 

“You spin your story out with bootless words,” 
protested Lavandien, lighting a cigarette. “ Blue 
blood will never stoop to tell a lie.” 

“Perhaps. But it may course the veins more 
warmly than convenient ; a thing that happened to 
a certain lieutenant of my acquaintance. One day, 
leaving Paris at the end of a furlough, it became 
necessary for me to visit the War Office for in- 
structions. I was in civilian garb, in a great hurry^ 


26 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


and I made the mistake of not shutting a certain 
door after me. Observe by what a rusty hook hang 
human destinies. Had there but been an auto- 
matic spring to that accursed door, I might to-day 
have been a captain or a colonel. In any case, I 
should certainly not have been here.'' 

“ I am exceedingly sorry when I reflect there was 
no spring,” smiled the viscount. 

“ Thank you for chorus. However that may be, 
the official head then present, a puffy, portly man, 
directed me to shut the door behind me in no very 
courteous terms. Had you but known me at that 
fire-eating epoch of my life! . . . Without a word 
I closed it, remaining on the inside, and, equally 
without a word, I laid my card upon the page that 
he was writing, so close to his nose I must have 
ruffled his mustache.” 

“Good, good!” cried Lavandien. “I smell a 
lovely duel.” 

“ It was not the desire to do no more that with- 
held me. Only, I, as lieutenant, was forced to ob- 
serve a certain etiquette to my superior officer 
masquerading as a head-clerk. This personage 
informed me of the tedious stumbling-block, in 
bombastic words, retaining my card. What could 
I do save make my exit, choking with concentrated 
wrath, and regain my regiment. Two days after- 
ward my colonel, now General de Berdons, sent for 
me to his august presence.” 

“ He has a charming daughter,” put in Alain. 

“ I know it well, for he became my best friend in 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


27 


the sequel. You will guess he hardly sent for me 
to offer me his daughter’s heart and hand, espe- 
cially as she was very young. He sentenced me to 
sixty days in a fortified place, and then made me 
go through the ordeal of listening to a lecture on 
the account of our bureaucrat, accused me of hav- 
ing tried to provoke my superior officer, neither more 
nor less. And I have to thank my colonel for spar- 
ing me a court-martial in virtue of my brilliant an- 
tecedents. I passed two weary months in Besangon 
citadel, pondering the theoretic virtues of meek- 
ness, and, on the sixty-first, sent in my resigna- 
tion.” 

‘‘The deuce take such an exaggerated report!” 

“My resignation accepted, I travelled far and 
near, distrustful of my temper. I even came out 
here, like yourself, a curious tourist. Then, when 
I felt at liberty to exercise my spleen without the 
risk of sixty days in a fortress — that is to say, at the 
expiration of a twelvemonth — I paid a second visit 
to the famous bureau. This time I took particular 
care to leave the door ajar behind me. My enemy, 
then sitting writing at the self-same table, asked 
me, almost civilly this time, to repair my neglect. 
‘I have neglected nothing, sir,* I said. The poor 
devil looked at me keenly and remembered me. 
‘It was for this you sent in your resignation,’ he 
asked in singularly melancholy tones. One might 
have said that he foresaw the future. ‘Yes!’ I 
cried, crossing my arms six inches from his face. 
‘ It was for that. ’ ... We fought upon the morrow. 


28 


LOVE knows no law. 


He received a sword thrust, under which he lin- 
gered for six weeks, then died.” 

“The old ninny!” exclaimed Alain. “And you 
might well say that you were hot-headed. But the 
days are gone by when it is necessary to expatriate 
one’s self for an unfortunate duel.” 

Cleguerac reddened and remained mute for a few 
seconds. He went on, not without visible embar- 
rassment : 

“ My duel was unfortunate, even for my private 
fortune. To kill a man is a serious thing under 
any circumstances; much more when the deceased 
leaves behind him a wife and children entirely un- 
provided for. At that period I passed a number of 
nights that I hardly like to call to mind. As I cling 
to my natural allowance of peaceful sleep, I took 
measures to recover my capacity for it ; and it was 
then I achieved the reputation of a reckless gam- 
bler impelled by all the imps of Beelzebub.” 

“ I can guess the name of the game that cost you 
so dear,” cried de Lavandien, seeing his cousin in 
a novel light. “You had only to complete the 
reparation by marrying one of the girls.” 

“I preferred to facilitate their marriages with 
others. But virtue has its limitations. All was 
doubtless for the best, thanks to General de Ber- 
dons, who stood a true friend to me. Thanks to his 
devotion, the poor fatherless girls dreamed of I 
know not what celestial windfall. . . . As for your 
present friend, with the rest of the money he ac- 
quired the title to the farm on which this house is 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


29 


built. At the end of a year, other friends having in- 
vested funds in ^The Hermitage,’ a sugar-boiling 
house was built. ... So now you have my history. 
The moment is at hand that I may count on yours, 
if you possess one.” 

I have. Only it will not gain by coming after 
yours. I must admit that I have grown quite timid 
since I became acquainted with your genuine char- 
acter. You may make fun of me !” 

“My dear cousin, I often make fun at my own 
expense; never at that of other people.” 

“ Hum. . . . Not two hours ago, perceiving my 

prodigious pile of baggage ” 

Misericordia! I had forgotten all about them. 
Now I will to saddle for my inspectorial rounds. 
As for you, take a gentle nap. Organize your com- 
fort and accommodation with Rabat. Smoke, read, 
amuse yourself. Stay, here is the Assiniboine Morn- 
ing Star, one of last week’s, and in English. You 
don’t read English? Ah, Boulevardier! I will try 
and be back quite soon. We will dine, and you 
will tell me your history. I hope the silver thread 
of love runs through it.” 

“Love is not lacking,” said Alain with a sigh, 
“but ” 

“ Chut! not another word. It is so very seldom 
that I go to plays, I do not want to know the plotC 


III. 


The day passed quickly. Alain, no friend at 
any time to solitude, set Rabat’s tongue a-going, 
who, as it happened, had an equal aversion to si- 
lence. Then, the covered wagon having brought 
his luggage home, the traveller unpacked the 
smaller moiety, just enough to set his dressing- 
room in order. To bathe and dress next occupied 
the time till dinner. 

During those hours Maurice was engaged in far 
more arduous duties. He came home toward 7 
o’clock, changed his clothes, and the two friends 
now found themselves at table with the gayety of 
youth and an appetite that is peculiar to the prai- 
ries. At length when tea, under the garb of black 
coffee, had been served in front of the house, cig- 
arettes were once more lighted, and the host ex- 
acted the narration of the promised history. 

“You will reproach me with beginning at the 
end,” said Lavandien, “but it is the easiest way. 
Well, my dear friend, I have the honor to inform 
you that I am engaged.” 

Cleguerac bowed respectfully, and answered with 
exaggerated gravity: 

“ How old are you?” 

“ Twenty-four.” 


30 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


3 


'‘You are going to get married at four-and-twenty 
years of age! Yet you pretended, only this morn- 
ing, that my adventures took away your breath. 
Why, cousin, you appear to me a perfect giant, and 
therefore I am timid in my turn. Imagine it — en- 
gaged ! I will lay a wager that it was your mother 
made the match to save you from the talons of the 
harpies!” 

“ No,” answered Lavandien modestly. “ It was 
I — or rather we — who made the match.” 

The piercing gaze of the young farmer sought 
the hero’s countenance, where every thought shone 
through like amber pebbles in a silver brook. 

“Would it be indiscreet of me,” asked Maurice, 
“if I were to ask you. Is the lady French?” 

“My good friend, what a question! I have 
never been in favor of exotic marriages.” 

“ The best of luck. I thought perhaps it was a 
fair American, who had proved too sweet for you 
in New York City; even, perhaps, upon the ocean 
line. Such things have happened. 

“ Tell me the whole story, now ; we never see a 
girl in France select her husband for herself. Pa- 
tience ! The time is at hand when we will no longer 
exclaim, hearing of the accomplishment of this act 
of common sense: ‘It must have been a Yankee!’” 

“ Cousin, you are the Lafayette of the marriage 
contract. And now, if you do not wish me to die 
of curiosity, tell me what you are doing in the 
Great Northwest, six thousand miles or more from 
your fianc^ef 


32 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“Ah, that’s the nominative case!” sighed Lav- 
andien, coming down to mundane matters. “ De- 
cidedly I had better have begun at the beginning. 
In the first place (I confide the name to you be- 
cause you are a man of honor), I am to marry 
Mademoiselle Simone de Montdauphin. Are you 
acquainted with her?” 

“ Those who are marriageable girls to-day were 
children when / was in society,” observed Maurice. 

“Very true. Well, then, it shall suffice to say 
she is distinguished, clever, very pretty. Twenty- 
three years of age, and lives with her mother, who 
is a widow. As for her pedigree, you have heard 
of the Montdauphins?” 

Cleguerac waved his hand for answer, waiting for 
developments, the impersonation of the inevitable 
but. 

“For all that, would you believe it,” continued 
poor Alain, “at first my parents did not counte- 
nance the match. When I broached my prospects 
to my father — my resolution, shall I say? — he an- 
swered: ‘My friend, I have habitually figured, in 
my own mind, that the minimum entertainable 
dowry for yotir wife should be eight hundred thou- 
sand francs. But Mademoiselle Montdauphin, it is 
true, has personal advantages of no mean order. 
Prove to me that she’s a demi-millionaire, and you 
have my consent. If, on the contrary, you cannot, 
think no more of her. Now — she comes nowhere 
near the latter figure.” 

“The dickens, my dear fellow! After that, I 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 33 

prognosticate but scanty filial obedience, in an- 
other year, when you come of age.” 

“ I wish to avoid disobedience, and Simone ap- 
proves my wishes. Thus I am limited to laying 
before my father that I am overhead in love, and 
that my attachment is lifelong. So, you will under- 
stand, while redoubling my attentions and keeping 
our love more brilliantly aflame than ever, we 
shrouded our appointments in mystery. But,” 
sighing, “ I suppose there are parental spies in 
every place, and ever will be. One fine morning 
my father posed me with the following ultimatum : 
‘ Either give me your word that you will never see 
Mademoiselle Montdauphin again, or — go abroad.’” 

“Aha!” cried Clegudrac, “ I begin to understand. 
’Twas an unhappy banished man who knocked at 
my door. Well, my friend, you were hardly in the 
wrong when you inferred your father had his scru- 
ples.” 

“Yes,” answered Alain, lifting his head proudly, 
“ I am an exile, but an exile of your own persua- 
sion; that is to say, a man who wishes to grow 
self-sufficing, and who will ask you for a course of 
lessons in the art.” 

Maurice made a gesture of surprise, which his 
cousin took for one of admiration. Modestly the 
latter protested ; 

“ The idea wasn’t altogether mine. Allow me to 
finish my story. In point of fact, my parents think 
to gain their ends by superior strategy. They 
packed me off to New York with letters of intro- 
3 


34 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


duction, and of credit, too, to the millionaire Pau- 
vell. Well, Pauvell has a most delightful daugh- 
ter; very pretty, on my honor. You begin to un- 
derstand their scheme? Next in order, you shall 
learn mine or rather Simone’s plan. I came out 
here to see you, to ascertain the resources of the 
country. Between ourselves, I don’t suppose the 
dear girl had the clearest of ideas. I start as a far- 
mer. Soon I am twenty-five. Then we get mar- 
ried. A few short years of happy toil will pass 
away like magic. Some day or other my father 
forgives me. And there you are ! What do you 
say to my idea?” 

Maurice regarded his interlocutor with stony 
eyes, as though he was looking at a madman or a 
full-fiedged soar-or-perish hero. For himself, the 
question promised to prove grave ; and, at any rate, 
one thing seemed certain — that his house would 
never seem the same again. The previous even- 
ing, at that very hour, and seated at the self-same 
table, he was congratulating himself on the arrival 
of a visitor who would, at any rate for the time be- 
ing, prove entertaining. And at this very moment, 
reflecting on the role that lay before him, he opined 
that peace, though purchased at the price of soli- 
tude, was precious. 

What would he have thought could he have seen 
the coming change in his laborious, tranquil life, 
and, reading the future, guessed that the preced- 
ing evening passed tHe-h-tHe with the eternal si- 
lence of the prairie, would prove the last evening 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


35 


of his life destined to be untroubled with the bitter- 
ness of others, his own uncertainties or odious re- 
grets ? 

Somewhat astonished by the reigning silence, 
Alain exclaimed: 

“You do not answer, cousin.” 

“ The answer you demand is harder far than you 
imagine,” said Maurice. “I must take time to 
think, and ask you several questions, too. We 
will resume our conference at d^jeHner to-morrow, 
on the stroke of twelve. Till then, I trust three 
nights in a sleeping-car will awaken your indul- 
gence for the lowly beds we make shift to rest on at 
'The Hermitage.’ ” 

“ What ! I am not to see you before the middle 
of the day?” 

“Do you wish an account of my earlier hours?” 
smiled Cleguerac. “ At 4 o’clock the morning-gun, 
then a plunge in Moose Brook, a turn with the 
dumb-bells or on the flying-bar, a serious first 
breakfast. Toward five to the saddle, and a tour of 
inspection that must last till luncheon time — your 
d^jeHner, Ah, my dear Lavandien, I don’t think you 
have the faintest idea of what the life of a farmer 
in the Great Northwest inevitably means.” 

“No? But I wish to learn. Therefore, let me 
beg you to saddle two horses instead of one to-mor- 
row morning.” 

“ Neither do you seem to have any misgivings as 
to what 'the saddle,’ in this country infers. To- 
morrow, during the day, I will enlighten you. 


36 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Then, if your heart is in the same place as at pres- 
ent, you shall mount. I think I can promise you 
the experiment will hardly prove monotonous. 
And now, allow me the honor of lighting you to 
your apartment.” 

A few minutes afterward the young viscount 
found himself alone in his small sleeping-room, so 
small that his baggage occupied a full third. In spite 
of his fatigue the strangeness of the sights that he 
had seen, disillusions already felt by instinct, and 
difficulties ahead, just touched so far with dainty 
finger-tip, drove off all thought of slumber. Above 
all, the ill-disguised coldness of his friend Cleguerac 
in regard to his projects, so altogether different from 
the enthusiasm he expected, seemed to freeze the 
faith he had, or rather wished to have. As faith- 
ful servants of the Lord in similar cases have resort 
to prayer, so did this faithful neophyte of love 
allow his thoughts to fly to his divinity, Simone. 
(At that very instant Simone was driving with her 
mother from a grand race-ball, beneath the first 
rays of a sun already rising in la helle France.') 
Then our young traveller seated himself before 
the only table, opened his morocco blotter, and, 
taking a sheet of paper marvellously gold stamped 
with his arms and initials, began to write. 

Let sticklers for extreme propriety be reassured — 
it was not to his betrothed that he was writing. 
Madame de Montdauphin, who allowed her daugh- 
ter to waltz for hours at a stretch in sweetest lib- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 37 

erty, would not have permitted her to receive a 
single line from this very problematical lover. 

But Simone had friends, and, in the circle of 
those friends, one writ with her in sour misfort- 
une’s book — that is to say, the victim of insuffi- 
cient means whom her parents had married at the 
age of twenty-seven to a, till recently, young man 
too weary of the world, we may assume, to resist 
the siege with vigor and effect. While Simone 
was yet in search of a husband the beautiful Ma- 
thilde had already rendered hers as ridiculous on 
account of his unhappiness as he might have been 
enviable by reason of his millions. His name was 
Gravino, whom the king of Naples, his legitimate 
sovereign, had rewarded well for certain financial 
missions he had carried through in Paris. These 
missions had been the double cause of his enrich- 
ment, and of his penetration of the social circles in 
which he first encountered his Mathilde. The 
Papal nuncio married them ; the Pope sent special 
blessings; all Paris called upon them, for our good 
Mathilde knew exactly where to pin her social faith, 
and never made new friends unless she knew that 
they were “safe.” Under the age of thirty men 
had no existence for her. Gray hairs were far in- 
deed from frightening her. Not through any un- 
natural dislike of golden locks, but one must pay 
their price for wisdom and discretion. The young, 
pitilessly held at bay, became good friends, it is 
true, either because Mathilde did not wish to 


38 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


seem to slight them, or because the house, when all 
was said and done, was very pleasant. 

Such might, perhaps, have been Lavandien’s 
case with half a score more years upon his head. 
Mathilde, to make up, had devoted herself body 
and soul to the success of the marriage of her old- 
time lover to Simone. She was the link of union 
left between them — discreet, immaculate. Shall we 
blame her for reading to her young friend any let- 
ters from her daily mail that could possess the 
slightest interest? Was she committing a crime 
by writing to a traveller we wot of the daily deeds 
and words of such and such a lady ? Besides, she 
was the only one, beyond the interested two, that 
knew the secret of the correspondence, and it 
amused her vastly. 

Thus, it was to the Countess Gravino that Alain 
had taken pen to write. After all, he stood with her 
upon a cerain licensed platform of flirtation, watch- 
ful in style, careful of effects, but far from disa- 
greeable. 

Accordingly Lavandien gave an account of his 
arrival at “The Hermitage,” which he depicted as 
a flourishing scene of enormous activity, throned 
in a land of poetry and of the picturesque. Be- 
neath his facile pen the buffaloes, in countless herds, 
roamed the emerald prairies. As was but just, 
he did not quite forget the Indians, though he for- 
got to say that many of them were farm-hands at 
thirty cents a day, so as not to spoil the picture. 

“We are encircled by Indians on every side, but 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


39 


it would be wrong for us to be afraid of them. Their 
formerly ferocious instincts are becoming milder 
daily, and squabbles are of very rare occurrence. 
Nevertheless we go, both day and night, fully 
armed, so that if the occasion arose they would not 
find us altogether unprepared.” 

While in the act of writing this, he reflected that 
he had no revolver ready to his hand. Quitting 
the writing-table he carefully charged his fowling- 
piece, and even more complacently returned to his 
effusion. 

“ Besides, these assassins have paid dearly for 
the knowledge that Cleguerac’s rifle has never 
missed its aim yet. The devil of a man is a type 
whose very existence you Parisians scarce suspect. 
To keep up a brisk fire all by himself against a 
dozen yelling Black Feet, to gallop for ten or 
twelve hours at a stretch before a band of blood- 
thirsty savages, to ride down a bison at killing pace, 
to remain for twenty-four hours in the saddle on a 
harvest-day, these feats to him are nothing. All 
the world, of whatever nationality, achieves them 
easily at the end of a few months of prairie-life. 

“ But Cleguerac was a hero from his birth. Only 
just turned twenty, he killed his man in a pro- 
tracted duel, which causes him to be, at times, a 
little gloomy, somewhat misanthropic. I imagine 
him to be fairly accessible to the master passion, for 
love is a thing he esteems at its true value. How- 
ever that may be, my life, which I related to him, 
making, of course, no mention of your name, both 


40 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


occupies and interests him. We shall see what he 
can yet do for us. Be wise to note that my awful dad 
has not the faintest doubts as to the way in which 
I am utilizing the voyage he recommended. I am 
arranging for him to think me all the time in New 
York. Avoid the slightest indiscretion. 

“ And now, I must leave the kindest, sweetest 
friend I have on earth. Repeat, you know to 
whom, the motto that will ever be ours, ‘ In life — 
in death.’ ” 

Lavandien signed the letter and left it in his 
blotting-pad until it could be mailed. Then, be- 
fore going to bed, he scanned the little valley with 
eager eyes. A brilliant moon had spread its dusky 
silver carpet on the earth in places rendered vaguer 
by the sleepy vapors. Only on this brilliant fore- 
ground the shadow of the house fell square and 
swart, depicting, one might think, a massive fort- 
ress. Within as well as out of doors the silence of 
the infinite prairie reigned supreme. 

Poetry and imagination were by no means Alain’s 
strongest points. But the vastness and sublimity 
of the spectacle beneath his eyes, the novelty of 
the scene, the excitement of extended travel, prob- 
ably even the intentional exaggeration of the pic- 
tures he had just been drawing, all these united 
causes intoxicated him with a sort of enthusiasm of 
which those who knew him would have deemed 
him incapable. Surprised and charmed with this 
exuberance of physical and mental life, he began 
to think himself, in all good faith, an object of in- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


41 


genuous admiration. A man had just appeared (in 
the looking-glass) to whom a rolling ocean was as 
nothing, who traversed immense continents in 
sheer sport, who would recoil before no danger, 
no fatigue, so that he might win the woman of his 
choice — achieve a fortune, all for her. This man — 
himself. 

But why this solitude? Why these shades that 
doomed him to inaction? Wherefore was there no 
extraordinary task to be achieved, no war to wage? 

“ At least I wake while others sleep. We shall 
not be taken by surprise.” 

This reflection of his responsibility for the gen- 
eral welfare was not unpleasing. He rose and took 
his gun to make a watchman’s round in order to 
see if all the doors were fast, each window latched, 
and no suspicious noise to tease the slumber of the 
night. Softly he regained the dining-chamber, 
which served as hall and eating-room as well. . . . 

Between the wings of the wide-open door the 
pure cool air of night was flooding in to chase away 
the last effluvia of a blazing afternoon. At the 
distance of fifty paces from police headquarters 
people would have taken greater precautions against 
thieves and wandering lunatics. In a single sec- 
ond the viscount fell from his heroics to the depth 
of the ridiculous. ^ 

“ If Cleguerac could behold me now, he would 
certainly laugh at me until the dawn of day.” 

A few minutes afterward he was in bed, having 
unloaded his superfluous fowling-piece. 


IV. 


A PLEASING, hospitable sound aroused Lavandien 
at seven in the morning. He opened his eyes. A 
chef in full costume — a veritable kitchen poten- 
tate — was laying on his table the first of the innu- 
merable cafh-au-lait of the day. He recognized 
Rabat, and, having an excellent appetite, the view 
of these effective preparations chased away even 
the memory of his midnight illusions. 

“My cousin has had his breakfast?” asked he, 
holding out his cup to be filled a second time. 

“Yes, sir. And a more substantial one than 
monsieur is about to make. But monsieur told me 
coffee would be sufficient.” 

“ For to-day, yes. Starting from to-morrow, 
place me on the same regime as your master. For 
I, also, mean to become a farmer.” 

Rabat was so much astonished that he set the 
pair of patent-leather shoes he had taken up to 
dust upon the table, where he contemplated them 
with the admiration sailors have for all that is ex- 
tremely neat and shiny. With an air of compas- 
sion more eloquent than words, he cried : 

“Ah, monsieur! do not say that. When you 
are a Canadian farmer I shall be an admiral.” 

“And why so. Monsieur Rabat?” said Alain 
rather nettled. 


42 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


43 


Rabat, formerly one of the mOwSt indefatigable 
talkers on record, did not often gain a similar 
opening. 

“Monsieur,” be answered, “I perceive my mas- 
ter bas not- told you all be bas endured since we 
came bere. Probably be remembers it but ill him- 
self. He is a man wbo only sees that wbicb be 
wants to see — tbe trouble it takes to accomplish 
bis end be does not reckon. But as for me, I rec- 
ollect. When we arrived in this country we should 
literally have perished of hunger, only fortunately 
sailors have a way of making their wants known by 
signs. Nobody understood us.” 

“I thought,” said Alain, “that there were very 
many of our countrymen in Canada.” 

The ex-sailor shrugged his shoulders expressively 
and replied : 

“ Three years ago, at Wabigoon, our nearest town, 
you would not have found a single Frenchman. 
And yet they call it a city ! To get a glass of cog- 
nac you must go to a drug-store. And as for its 
being nearest ! Well, I will tell you — if twenty-seven 
miles is nearness ! When snow is on the ground — 
and there is snow for five months in the year — in 
order to arrive at your destination, you have con- 
stantly to use a compass. You do not understand 
English?” 

“ Not yet.” 

“Well, monsieur, do not learn. No sooner had 
your cousin taken a few lessons than he had to take 
a course of boxing-lessons, for he was now cognizant 


44 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


of the meaning of what some cried out at him as he 
passed by. When he had nearly slaughtered half 
a dozen in the national fashion, the rest began to 
hold their tongues. Now they take off their hats 
to him. But that was nothing. After the men, 
horses ; and it was with the equine kingdom I be- 
held the fiercest battles. Ah, monsieur! I would 
sooner pass the bar of Senegal in a toy canoe. I 
was as seasick as a soldier merely looking on. At 
other times a dozen of the vile brutes would take it 
into their crazy heads to run away. Then came a 
chase! Sixty, eighty mile’s on horseback — three 
nights on the prairie with a packet of sandwiches. 
And this but the beginning of the undertaking. 
Imagine the land to be levelled, kitchen construct- 
ed, the tardy chills of spring, the early frosts of 
autumn, sick horses, broken-down vehicles, and the 
getting and keeping Indian workmen from the re- 
serve. But I am foolish. You were surely jesting, 
monsieur. Farmer! What a misfortune! You 
have a profession that is worth much more ; your 
baggage is sufficient to show that.” 

Rabat was admiring Alain’s enormous pile of 
baggage. The latter, declining to carry on con- 
versation with one so tediously verbose, asked for 
hot water and at what o’clock the mail arrived. 

Rabat’s white cap, which since the commence- 
ment of the interview had been gradually mounting 
to the top of his head, now fell forward almost to 
his eyebrows. 

“The mail, monsieur? Sometimes there is a 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


45 


mail to Wabigoon — occasionally. There it awaits 
our calling. But as we do not often expect letters, 
we do not go on purpose. We take advantage of 
some business in the town, or wait. Ah, mon- 
sieur ! you are by no means the first Parisian who 
took a fancy to become acquainted with the prairies. 
I never saw one yet hold out a month. With all 
due respect to monsieur, I give him fifteen days.” 

Alain shrugged his shoulders, but in vain did he 
endeavor to make light of this old babbler’s whim- 
perings. In spite of himself his enthusiasm of the 
night before evaporated like a midsummer mist. 

“ And why, may I ask, do you condescend to re- 
main in such a heaven-forsaken country?” he asked 
satirically. 

“ Oh, as for me,” replied the ancient mariner, “ I 
laugh at mails and letters; I don’t know howto 
write. Monsieur,” here he approached Alain and 
lowered his voice as though they were surrounded 
by eaves droppers, ’tis all on account of a woman 
that you behold me in this unhappy country.” 

‘‘A woman in the old man’s case as well — poor 
devil,” mused Lavandien. 

His ill-humor changed into fraternal charity. A 
word of encouragement it seemed his duty to ad- 
minister. 

“Well, well, my hero, I hope the quarrel may 
be yet patched up, and that the next thing we shall 
hear of will be your marriage.” 

A spasm of consternation and anger distorted the 
old seaman’s weather-beaten features. 


46 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


*‘Our marriage, monsieur! You don’t know 
Zetie ! ’Twas she who ran after me, even from the 
instant of my landing. I wanted to establish my- 
self at Bordeaux, which is my native place; she 
forced me to flee prematurely — flee far and wide. 
I tried five places more in various countries. In 
one and all of those five places I beheld her bearing 
sheer on to board me, grappling-irons out ” 

“She is a wealthy woman?” queried Lavandien. 
“ The travels that you made her take must have 
cost a fortune.” 

“She is a stewardess on a passenger steamer!” 
groaned the contumacious lover. “We became 
acquainted in China, a little while before the For- 
mosa campaign. She is a countrywoman of mine. 
If a poor devil of a sailor was forced to marry all 
his countrywomen ! But this time I think I have 
given her the slip serene, she and her little cabin- 
boy, of whom she wanted to make me a present 
thrown into the contract, notwithstanding that his 
hair was as crinkly as a high-caste negro’s. If 
ever I see her steamer rounding the quay at Wabi- 
goon, I will give in and marry her. Monsieur, 
you have had a good look at me. I am no more a 
coward than my fellow-man ; but I know Zetie, and 
I know she has more vitriol than holy-water for me.” 

“You folk are all the same,” said Alain, for 
whom this tale of infidelity in low life had but little 
interest. “Make ready for my toilet, please, and 
leave the room.” 

An hour afterward he quitted his chamber and 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


47 


repaired to the veranda for a little fresh air. 
Though it was only ten by his watch, the boarding 
that served for promenade was cracking beneath 
the impetuous sunshine, in haste to make the world 
forget five months of frost-bit winter. He took 
refuge in Maurice’s study, where huge piles of 
stores preserved a certain relative coolness. Hea- 
ven knows how much he would have given at that 
moment for a current Figaro. But he beheld no 
other journal save the Assiniboine Star, two weeks 
old, and printed in English. Chemical handbooks, 
agricultural pamphlets, a copy of the tariff laws, an 
abstract of the proceedings of the Canadian Parlia- 
ment, left him uninterested. At last he found a 
worm-eaten novel, and, stretching himself on the 
only sofa in the place, essayed to read. But soon 
the volume fell from his listless hands; he had 
thrice seen the drama taken from this ultra-popular 
romance. 

A numbness fell upon his soul — a sort of hope- 
less numbness, which, like the rains of autumn, 
promised to last as long as life itself. Not to 
suffice unto one’s self is the Frenchman’s national 
defect. Accustomed from childhood to look with- 
out for everything, from his judgments in politics 
and art to his amusements, he even looks without 
for fortune itself ; since, in France, filial inheritance 
is the normal, almost compulsory, source of ulti- 
mate income. Alain de Lavandien, as a member 
of Parisian society, was doubly French. 

It is easy to imagine that this high-strung crea- 


48 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


ture was often a prey to quick and cruel reactions. 
Twelve hours before, astonished himself at his own 
courage, he was thinking that the men of Navarre, 
the Moors and the Castillians, were slow in riding 
up to dispute the possession of his particular Chi- 
mene. But a pessimistic conversation, an uncom- 
fortable toilet-chamber, a too untempered bit of 
sunshine, and, on top of all, a morning without 
either a ride on horseback, letters, newspapers, 
complicated with a spell of most unusual self-in- 
terviewing, now proved sufficient to envelop past, 
present, and future in one dreary wet sheet of re- 
flection. Interrogate the fugitives in a battle 
panic, you will find among the number many 
thoughtful heroes. 

Happily for the heroism of the young viscount, 
his reflections were interrupted by the arrival of 
Cleguerac. They dined together gayly. It was a 
pleasure to watch Maurice eat ; not that he ate so 
very much, but proudly, so to speak, as a man who 
makes a conquest even of his dinners. 

The repast over, instead of taking a nap for half 
an hour — almost a necessity in the long days of 
summer — the farmer turned the conversation him- 
self to his guest’s affairs: 

“ If I understood you correctly, you think of set- 
tling in my neighborhood. Then you are to return 
to France for Mademoiselle Montdauphin and bring 
her over here, having, of course, first made her 
Viscountess Lavandien. After that you will set to 
work, as you see me and many others, so that you 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


49 


may make your fortune, when, with flags flying 
and fifes piping, you will return to your own world, 
back to society and your former habits. Am I 
correct in my suppositions?” 

“Not precisely,” said Alain, with some hesita- 
tion. Our idea is to break down the opposition of 
my family. I know my parents. If, every day 
they were to see me pass, denied, chastised, and 
almost starved by their own judgment, their irrita- 
tion would feed upon itself. Seeing the eyes of 
the world upon them, they would make a virtue of 
inflexibility. They are still young. Heaven 
knows how long I should have to survive on 
crusts; for we should get nothing much more 
sustaining were we to remain in Paris. I applaud 
a young man who, seeking a position, some day 
finds a hundred louis — drawn from a friend’s 
pocketbook. But you know how it is. The 
bachelor who borrows the money is a genuine 
comrade, often cleverer than yourself. Married, 
if he risks a similar appeal, he is a beggar pure 
and simple. And I will not seek to describe the 
sufferings of a young lady obliged to shun her 
former friends in order to conceal the fact that she 
is wearing dresses that they first became acquainted 
with two years ago. I admit that Simone would 
not be madly amused with the excitements of prai- 
rie-life, but she could not fail to be happier than 
in Paris with purses like ours.” 

“It is very possible, ” said Cleguerac, struck with 
the feasibility of the argument. 

4 


50 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“Now,” continued Lavandien, “let us maintain 
the opposite hypothesis. We disappear. It is 
vaguely known we are ‘in America.’ The rumor 
starts almost of its own accord that we are gathering 
gold by handfuls. It is easy to waft the rumor 
Parisward ; soon we are taken for potential million- 
aires. My parents are flattered ; tender memories 
return ; and soon their arms are held wide open for 
the prodigal.” 

“In fine,” said Maurice, with a genial smile, 
“ you are of the opinion that the pro(iigal son, if 
he wants the fatted calf killed for him, should 
have the reputation of being able, at a pinch, to 
pay the market value of the entire feast, wine, 
lights and all. I do not say this may not be; but 
I must not disguise from you the fact that this will 
not console the calf’s mother for its loss. This is 
what I am anxious about on your behalf, and, 
above all, on Mademoiselle de Montdauphin’s. I 
wish to think you know your future wife’s entire 
disposition?” 

“ Her disposition ! Poor Simone ! I had every 
opportunity of studying it for two entire seasons, 
during which I saw her five times a w’eek. I am 
sure we must have waltzed together more than fifty 
times.” 

“And — she dances well?” 

The words bore less heavily on Mademoiselle de 
Montdauphin herself than on her maladroit knight- 
errant. Alain found them not any more to his 
taste for being uttered with extreme gravity. In 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


51 


another place he would have consulted his watch 
and found a convenient appointment to waft him 
from the side of this unsmiling wit. But necessity 
made such a move as impossible as it would have 
been for one of the Siamese twins to have left his 
brother to his own reflections after a hasty word. 
He assumed a saddened air, and replied that he 
was already unhappy enough, and that it was not 
his fault if the world was accustomed to consecrate 
its evenings to the ballroom rather than to the li- 
brary. 

“When you understand my future wife,” he con- 
cluded, with a certain cold dignity, “ you will see 
that she knows much more than how to dance — 
that she has many other merits in addition to her 
beauty — even the merit of the will to follow me to 
the ends of the earth. I hope that you will find no 
need to ask me then the reason why I love her,'' 

Cleguerac protested he would not ask another 
question, not even why this paragon, Simone, had 
taken it into her head to fall in love with him, 
Lavandien. To change the conversation, or prob- 
ably with an even more profound intention, he 
spoke of the Pauvells and their charming daughter. 

“Gladys! She passes for one of the belles of 
New York,” answered Alain. “I dare to tell you 
she deserves the reputation; for, you will agree 
with me, it is possible to love a lady all her days 
without falling into the way of thinking every 
other woman ugly.” 

“Of these things I know nothing,” said Maurice, 


52 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


lowering his eyes so as to conceal what might be 
passing in his mind. “ I do not remember that I 
ever loved a lady all her life.” 

“ Come, come, my clever cousin, I see that you 
are making merry with me once again. That does 
not prevent its being true that I spent three weeks 
at Newport with the Pauvells; that I saw Gladys 
from morning to night all through those twenty 
days ; that we danced, swam, drove and rode to- 
gether, played lawn tennis, and chatted in the 
moonlight, during which conversations she never 
concealed from me her partiality for titles. Never- 
theless, behold me in the desert ; but, as you will see, 
not for lack of means and opportunity to marry 
Gladys Pauvell.” 

There was nothing to reply to such an argu- 
ment, and, besides, Maurice was the first to give 
others the credit of good intentions. With cordial 
sincerity he extended his hand and spoke thus in 
apology : 

“ One becomes a little rude and rough after a few 
years in the Great North West. But the juice is 
sweeter than the rind. If, by good fortune, you 
should settle in this vicinity, your wife and you will 
always find in me a genuine friend. Looking for- 
ward, we will begin your initiation with a country 
ride. Put on your very toughest hunting-wear. 
Let us make ready for the coming strife.” 


V. 


A QUARTER of an hour afterward, master and 
pupil installed themselves in the buggy, or rather 
hung suspended in the attitudes of decorative 
sprites, for the narrow vehicle was already almost 
filled with farming implements. Happily the 
farm was not exceedingly extensive. Once more 
they ascended the microscopic mountain inhabited 
by the German. Cleguerac informed his compan- 
ion that the name of the latter was the Baron 
d’Oberkorn, and that the daughter's was Irene. 

“She is now in the veranda!” cried Alain. 

“Indeed,” said Maurice, shrugging his shoul- 
ders, “I think she passes nine-tenths of her life 
there.” 

As on the day before, the neighbors saluted with 
an air of the greatest ceremony, which told of an 
acquaintance short of intimacy. 

“You are hardly on sympathetic terms?” put in 
the young Parisian. 

“ Our relations begin and end with salutations, a 
word or two if passing on the public highway, and 
to plain figures in the beetroot heason. He sells 
me his entire crop.” 

“What!” cried the French viscount, “pay a 
Prussian money f 

“ Would to heaven we had never paid the Prus- 
5J 


54 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


sian’s money on less disadvantageous terms!” ex- 
claimed Clegu^rac coolly. 

‘"’Tis hard, nevertheless,” cried the young pa- 
triot, shaking his head. 

“ Not much harder than to pay the tariff that 
board and lodge Wolfe’s successors.” 

“Who was this Wolfe?” 

“The English general who deprived us of the 
possession of Canada.” 

“Ah! but that was so long ago.” 

This political conversation was interrupted by 
the force of circumstances. The buggy came to a 
full stop before the outer paling of the settlement. 
Maurice unhitched the mare and girthed her with 
the Mexican saddle he had brought along with 
him. When he was in the saddle with his large 
straw hat garnished with stamped leather band, 
his tanned leather breeches garnished with ivory 
buttons, a lasso hanging to the pummel (which 
rose nearly as high as his breast), nobody would 
have supposed our cavalier, whose fashion of 
mounting and riding were equally barbaric, had 
been at one time the centaur of the military riding- 
school. He entered the paddock, gazed round for 
a moment for the mount he was in search of, and 
suddenly darted off at breakneck speed. Alain, 
following him with his eyes, murmured slowly: 

“Yes, a genuine prairie centaur. But why this 
utter change of style? It’s childish. I shall al- 
ways adhere to the tenets of the classic school.” 

Classic this Parisian was, undoubtedly. Patent- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


55 


leather boots, flat-soled, leggings of mouse-colored 
chamois leather, pants of dark tweed, bridle-hand 
like a Rotten Row dandy, all irreproachably cor- 
rect, save the saddle-cover, which consisted of a 
huge straw mat imposed by Maurice, instead of 
the half-moon of black felt a Hickel would have 
deemed the only thing. 

“No stealing away, friend,” Maurice had pe- 
remptorily commanded. 

Lavandien, the correct, agreed. When Maurice 
said some things in a certain tone, those around 
him were usually willing to coincide. 

The horses, grouped in irregular knots at the 
limits of the pasturage, began to show signs of 
agitation. They had ceased to browse, each head 
was raised, neck stretched, and ear pointed in the 
direction of their enemy, the boss. These children 
of the prairie, hardly genuine captives, often but 
half-broken, knew already that one among them was 
doomed that day to don the saddle and the bridle, 
and, after a short struggle in full view of its com- 
panions, led away to bear an ignominious load. 
The problem was, not to become the victim. 

Soon the groups, just now compact and sympa- 
thetic, became detached and soon flew into divergent 
atoms before that bent figure, already leaning for- 
ward to the lasso. The confusion became so com- 
plete, the distance so great, that it was difficult to 
tell, among the black points scurrying across the 
field of view, which horse was the cause of the 
excitement. At last, in a quarter of an hour, 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


56 

Maurice rejoined his comrade, leading far behind 
a horse that seemed profoundly “taken down,” 
but, as regarded any new order, showed little desire 
for immediate obedience. 

“ Here’s your fellow!” cried Maurice, leaping to 
the ground. “His name is Blackfoot. I hereby 
make you a present of him. Do not judge him by 
his present looks. Were he well-fed and groomed 
for a month or two, you would only have to mount 
him in the Bois one morning to have three hun- 
dred louis in your pocket.” 

“You have forgotten to shoe him,” said Alain, 
laughing, “ and also to have him primarily clipped.” 

“ As for the clipping, I admit he is open to criti- 
cism. Nevertheless, as you shall see, the young 
anarchist will already wear a bridle, and allow a 
saddle on his back — on condition that there is no- 
body in it. He and I have often discussed the 
problem without coming to an understanding. I 
yield the field to you. Since you love horses, the 
exercise I am about to set you will at least prove 
interesting, and even, I am certain, novel.” 

While speaking thus, Maurice transferred the 
saddle and bridle from Annie to Blackfoot. The 
animal observed an obstinate neutrality, something 
like the attitude of the king of the forest waiting 
for the cage door to be opened, so that he may 
spring at large upon the public. 

“Now,” said the professor, “spring upon your 
steed without touching the stirrups. Sink in- 
stantly into your seat, and hold on, no matter how. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


57 


Pay attention that this is no duel between civilized 
foes — that it has no laws or regulations whatsoever. 
Do not fall off ; that is the problem, stripped of all 
verbal trappings. Only do not tumble, because 
if you do fall off, your new mount will consider 
himself authorized by your weakness in that fatal 
moment to resist for another year to come. Bravo, 
cousin, that magnificent leap does you honor ! Now 
try and stay where you are. No, throw away the 
whip. Now clutch the pommel. Seize the mane. 
Thank heaven ! he does it. We are brothers. 
Admirable! Courage! The worst is over. You 
were born to lead a riding-school.” 

Lavandien had no leisure to listen further. The 
animal, hardly feeling the weight of a human being, 
proceeded to fulminate (the most expressive word 
that we can find) , his fore and rear legs in opposite 
directions, first having screwed them up into the 
compass of a circus-hoop. Without apparent an- 
ger, with the cool, customary action of the habit- 
ual gladiator, these prodigious skyward leaps 
brought him sooner or later back to earth, only 
to repeat the operation. Alain, accustomed to the 
knowing tricks and whims of the unmounted colts 
of his own country, in vain endeavored to reassume 
the classic seat in face of these patient, persever- 
ing, unique tactics of the American buck- jumper. 
What nerved him most was an odd word that had 
dropped from Rabat. It was necessary to show 
the Great North West that he had not “the sol- 
dier’s sea-sickness!” 


58 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“All goes well,” cried Maurice. “Come, you 
are a solid horseman.” 

“Only too much so,” exclaimed the human pro- 
jectile. “ Were I to fall off at least I should be at 
rest. Is this seance going to last forever? Look 
around you, cousin. Do you see any of my limbs 
that may have fallen off?” 

Clegu^rac informed his friend that an American 
horse rarely bucks for three hours on end, usually 
much less; that he stops abruptly as soon as he 
is thoroughly winded, remaining stupidly inert, 
and no more budging at the spur than though he 
were a wooden dummy. On the next day the scene 
begins anew. And so on for a week or two. Some 
fine day the animal is forced to admit that human 
obstinacy o’ercomes its own. Then he gives in 
remaining gentle, often passing from one extreme 
to the other, till you have sometimes to urge him 
on by every feasible method. 

Happily a similar strain of exaggeration had 
never been a part of Blackfoot’s character. He 
hardly bucks for half an hour; twenty niinutes, 
perhaps, would be the limit, after which his new 
master was able without discomfort to put him 
through the rudiments of domestic equitation. 
But, in truth, both man and beast stood in need of 
some repose. Soon they took leave of one another. 
Alain landed safely, himself unsaddled and un- 
bridled his fiery steed, picked up the debris of his 
whip that had been trodden into flinders, gave a 
look to the irreparable injuries to his costume, and. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 59 

somewliat out of breatli, resumed his seat in the 
buggy. 

The return to “The Hermitage” was accom- 
plished almost in silence. Alain, sticky with per- 
spiration, half-paralyzed with fatigue, reflected that 
when he arrived at his destination he would find 
nothing representing his valet-de-chambre and 
cosey dressing-room in the Avenue Marceau. He 
reflected, too, that the metamorphosis of Cleguerac 
had its own good elements, and that the Mexican 
saddle, with its straps an inch thick, was not without 
its advantages. As was only right and proper, he 
felt the conqueror’s legitimate pride; but he had 
only purchased victory by trampling under foot ev- 
ery principle of elegant and scientific equitation. 

Still, when he had taken a bath and changed his 
clothes, taking his seat at table with his cousin, he 
experienced the natural good humor of the man 
who has come through the terrors of a rough and 
trying day with flying colors. 

The conversation turned on Paris, as always hap- 
pens when a Parisian is in his best spirits. Alain, 
according to his custom, wished to speak of mat- 
ters theatrical, but soon perceived that the luckless 
Cleguerac did not even know the names of the lat- 
ter-day Molieres, Beaumarchais, Talmas, and So- 
phie Arnoulds, whose genius, beauty, follies, falls, 
and fits of spleen had occupied the entire attention 
of the City of Light for the last twelve months. 

“ What the • deuce am I to hit on to interest this 
man?” he thought, discouraged. 


6o 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


For that he had only to speak of his love, and his 
prospective marriage. But as he had on the pre- 
vious evening written the Countess Gravino, our 
lover considered his cousin no more an expert in 
affairs of the heart than in things theatrical, not to 
mention the fact that it caused him as much em- 
barrassment to speak about his marriage as an au- 
thor of a half-finished story, whose denouement is 
yet in the clouds. 

Happily he was one of those who are never short 
of subjects of conversation, preferring, above all, 
to talk about themselves. He began to recount his 
flattering intimacy with a young prince, a friend- 
ship prematurely broken by exile. A date came 
up in course of the recital. Cleguerac affirmed 
that his friend was mistaken about the day on 
which occurred the historic incident of “ the clos- 
ure.” 

“Oh, no,” said Alain, “the date is engraved for- 
ever on my recollection. The law was passed the 
same day that brought me one of the greatest joys 
of my life. But you would hardly believe the poign- 
ant emotions I experienced.” 

Maurice, believing that his interlocutor was re- 
ferring to the ever-to-be-remembered moment when 
Simone had made a present of her heart, energeti- 
cally protested, and would have displayed even 
greater interest had not the matter seemed a rather 
delicate one. Perhaps a brilliant sympathetic sec- 
ond volume of romance had been evolved from the 
first, which had appeared a little dull. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


6i 


“ It was my day for being balloted or blackballed 
at the club,” began the young Parisian, with his 
eyes fixed on vacancy. 

“Aha!” cried Maurice, inclined to laugh now at 
his own simplicity. 

“ I must tell you that my father, after voting for 
me, had not sufficient courage to await the sum- 
ming-up.” 

“A father is truly so when he is absent,” ob- 
served Clegudrac, who had succeeding in resuming 
his usual air of gravity.” 

“ I will observe that my candidacy was not alto- 
gether unsupported. My father, as you may re* 
member even better than myself, was once a very 
attractive man, and — the great ladies of his period 
brought their influence to bear.” 

“Certainly; your father’s friends became your 
own.” 

“Yes, but their sex prevented them from voting 
at the same time that their age precluded them 
from having much influence on the votes of others. 
Besides, as one of them said to me once : ‘ For one 
friend we make a score of enemies. It is like the 
government and the tobacco agencies.’ You thus 
perceive I had against me all those who ” 

“Who did not obtain the tobacco agency held 
by your father.” 

“ Precisely. Well, that day we were all sitting 
in our private salon, my father and mother with a 
few good friends. We pretended to be conversing, 
but conversation flapped a tired single wing. Ev- 


62 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


ery moment we were awaiting the grand verdict. 
That old wretch, Daddy Damblain, came rushing 
in like a whirlwind, with an air of overwhelmment. 
‘We are vanquished,’ he groaned. Mamma bit her 
lips; my father fell back on a sofa.” 

“You are blackballed!” 

“We all believed it. One of my cousins said: 
‘The introducers ought to make a stand.’ My 
mother added: ‘This kind of thing means five sep- 
ulchral dinner parties in three weeks. ’ An elderly 
aunt, a crazy legitimist given to long prayers, 
raised her eyes to heaven and cried : ‘ Perhaps we 
should thank God. The dear young man would 
have discovered there so many bad examples.’ 
Old Damblain was regarding us all with an air of 
blank amazement. It was a regular Palais Royal 
scene. Happily, Jean de Cabenay fell like a fuse 
into the darkness of this funeral pomp. Brave 
boy, I see him yet ! He embraced us all — even my 
aunt. M. de Damblain, who could not understand 
the motive for the newcomer’s joy, turns almost 
apoplectic with curiosity. He is attended to, and 
immediately we learn that he had come from Par- 
liament and not the club. We had thought but of 
my affair; he was thinking only of the princes. 
But, between ourselves, I passed a very villainous 
half hour, and you may judge whether I have not 
cause to remember that particular evening. ’ 

“Your hair did not turn white?” said Maurice, 
without a smile. 

“ Always the cynic, cousin. Seek only to dis- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


63 


cover facts. No, I don’t think I ever went through 
more in my life. As for my father, he was more 
pleased even than I. I found myself a few hun- 
dred louis in debt ; I had but to say the word — the 
dear man found the ready money without a mur- 
mur.” 

“ Why, when you were about it, did you not de- 
mand permission to marry Mademoiselle Simone?” 

“We had not then arrived at the marrying point,” 
said Alain dryly. 

This time the viscount was really vexed, with 
that harsh vexation whose object is one’s self. For 
an hour he had been serving as an object-lesson to 
this taciturn auditor, who let him talk as he liked, 
watching his every word. Accustomed to be taken 
seriously by all with whom he came in contact, ag- 
grandized in his own esteem by self-sacrifice and 
by a love he deemed sublime, persuaded that he 
was about to astonish the world by his courage and 
determination, in eight-and-forty hours he had 
earned one single item of commendation from 
Cleguerac — he was an excellent rider. As for the 
rest, he could not for a moment doubt that his 
cousin considered him a very ordinary being. 

This internal humiliation, for which he felt he 
could never forgive Maurice, was on the point of 
leading him to the rupture of sudden departure. 
But how excuse this new freak to Simone? He 
was now known at “The Hermitage.” His end 
and aim in coming there were known. He was 
not slow to perceive that it would be by no means 


64 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


easy to formulate new plans to carry out so crude 
a campaign. In his heart he had no other plan. 
To gain time was his strategy, and he saw things in 
a less rosy light, now that Cleguerac had put his 
finger on results without having the appearance of 
touching them. 

He broke up the seance by declaring that his in- 
terview with Blackfoot had fatigued him. 

“That may well be,” exclaimed Maurice. “ But 
we must strike the iron while it is hot, and hold high 
matinee to-morrow morning, too, returning to the 
scene of battle. In a few days, if all goes well, you 
will have a full-blooded, tractable mount; and, in 
this country, all is done on horseback, or with 
horses.” 

It was not long before Alain closed his eyes, 
comparing the cases of sweetheart and steed with a 
secret bitterness in the avowal that the conquest of 
the former was likely to prove even more arduous 
than a complete victory over the latter. 


VI. 


As soon as Alain woke up in the morning he 
perceived with pleasure that it was 8 o’clock al- 
ready. So much time gained. Rabat and the tray 
made their appearance ; but this time no conversa- 
tion was indulged in. Rabat was a pessimist, and 
the young Parisian knew only too well how his own 
heart was bound up in a brilliant future. 

With claiming the old salt’s services, he rose, 
impelled by a secret desire to quit a house in which 
he was on sympathetic terms neither with man nor 
master. There was still a streak of morning fresh- 
ness in the air. Alain crossed the brook, gained 
the miniature forest, and sat down in the shade to 
ponder on Simone. Soon he began to realize that 
while thinking of Simone was a very agreeable oc- 
cupation, thinking of certain facts in her connec- 
tion was the reverse. This was enough to termi- 
nate his reverie. 

Lifting his eyes he saw the Gray House on his 
right, upon the opposite bank. No other dwelling 
save “ The Hermitage” was to be seen in any direc- 
tion. And this was the abiding place of Prussians. 
Why did these obnoxious neighbors belong to the 
one nationality that must necessarily check friendly 
5 65 


66 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


and amusing intercourse ? But, anyhow, a house is 
a house, whatever the tongue its inmates speak; 
and our Parisian, already overcome with solitude, 
felt a strange nostalgia in the contemplation of a 
creature of his own species, a desire to meet a 
woman face to face, he might at least salute. Be- 
sides he experienced the necessity of lending occu- 
pation to his mind, his limbs, until the breakfast 
hour, still so far away ! 

He stood undecided for five minutes between 
idleness and want of employment, two sisters who 
are not always so friendly as we may think. These 
five minutes over, he quitted the wood, traversed 
the rustic bridge anew, and directed his footsteps 
to the toy cottage whose limitations seemed to mes- 
merize him. Where was he going, this cynical 
man of society, this exquisite who, in the Bois, would 
hardly turn his eyes to see an unthroned queen 
pass by? He is about to prowl about a little hil- 
lock to ascertain if a strange village maid is on her 
usual seat, book in hand, in the vague hope that his 
footfall on the grass may make her raise her glo- 
rious, candid eyes. 

At a distance of five hundred paces our amateur 
loafer thought he discovered that the bench was 
empty ; as he approached nearer a female form left 
the house in the direction of the veranda. Soon he 
perceived it was Irene Oberkorn, whose beauti- 
ful hair glowed in the sunshine like a cascade of 
liquid gold. This time, on his side, the viscount 
had an opportunity to scrutinize the girl, who for 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 6/ 

her part, was “ taking stock” of him without taking 
the least pains to mask her curiosity. 

“What a magnificent head of hair!” thought 
Alain. “ And that, at least, I may admire without 
wasting my enthusiasm over the beautifying powers 
of modern chemicals.” 

Fraiilein von Oberkorn had other admirable 
points besides her hair. She had a small, well- 
formed, pensive, un-German mouth, whose lips 
were often in the habit of standing just enough 
ajar to show a set of strangely even pearly teeth. 
Her eyes, a gray sapphire, passed with astonishing 
rapidity from the dreaminess of reverie to a fixity 
of regard unusual in blondes. At length the Vis- 
count de Lavandien, who thought himself as fine a 
judge of women as of horses — in theory, be it un- 
derstood — gave vent to his decisions in a formula 
not without significance in a man of his means : 

“Were she but properly dressed!” 

It did not take him long to frame another aspira- 
tion much more feasible: a thread for conversation. 
Still he hesitated. Not that he was by any means 
a timid man ; he had accosted unknown ladies be- 
fore successfully in places a thousand times less 
accommodating; but he remembered to have se- 
verely judged Cleguerac’s plain, commercial rela- 
tions with the German colonist. 

“ Heaven only knows what fun he would make 
of me, if he only knew I was within gun-shot of 
the ‘Gray House M” 

Involuntarily he turned from one side to another. 


68 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


to assure himself that Annie and her master were 
not within sight. What a nuisance this cousin 
was, and the deuce take men who cannot let the 
slightest theme escape their caustic wit ! 

At last he found himself at the foot of the hil- 
lock. He bowed; his salute was returned in a 
manner that a Parisian mother would have deemed 
too civil. But Paris was far away; and so, still 
worse, was Simone’s mother. The promenader 
hesitated, assured only by her appearance that this 
fair dweller in the prairie would herself resolve 
the mutual hesitation. She placed her book on her 
knees accordingly, and said, in very correct lan- 
guage, while with a pronounced accent and some 
delay to look for words : 

“I presume you wish to find out where your 
friend is. You will find him in his factory over 
yonder.” 

With a fine but somewhat weather-beaten hand, 
possibly a little labor-stained, the young girl des- 
ignated a point in the plain concealed by the min- 
iature mountain. 

“Do you think he will soon return?” asked Lav- 
andien, as though it was extremely probable that 
she would be acquainted with his movements. 

She seemed to find the question not unnatural, 
and answered, drawing out a little gold watch : 

“It’s II o’clock. M. de Clegu6rac quits his fac- 
tory at twelve.” 

Alain hesitated less and less ; was he not out of 
danger for another hour? 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


69 


“The sun is alarmingly hot,” he declared. 

“Would you like to come up and sit in the 
sliade?” asked the mistress of the “Gray House,” 
so simply that it was impossible for the young man’s 
vanity to experience the slightest fillip from the 
proposition. 

Alain did not err, as a rule, on the side of fatuity 
— which is a rare default to-day among men of his 
set — not that they have more modesty than former- 
ly, but they are not nearly so simple ; for, going to 
the causes of things, the snob is a noodle who meas- 
ures his dignity by his own opinions. Two min- 
utes afterward the new friends were seated side by 
side on the rough deal bench, under the shadow of 
an ample roof. Irene had placed her book between 
them, and so arranged her robe as to scant it of no 
single inch of possible length. 

“ How do you like our country?” she asked, with- 
out any appearance of timidity. 

“ But it is not your country, mademoiselle,” Alain 
returned, to show himself the owner of the conver- 
sation key. 

“ Oh !” said she, “ I was twelve when I came with 
papa to the Great North West. I can hardly im- 
agine the appearance of my birthplace.” 

“What, you hold your native land in no regret?” 

The German girl mentally sought for a few mo- 
ments what gravity even possible reproach, might 
lurk in this objection, then answered: 

“We were well off over yonder. My father had 
a lovely place, but they did him some injustice ; he 


;o 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


was punished on account of too great political frank- 
ness. We lost everything. Mamma died of mor- 
tification. So we went away partly because it had 
become necessary to work, partly not to look upon 
the land that had slain an innocent woman. How 
can I, then, regret my cowitryf 

“ Ah ! so they refine on nationality, even in Ger- 
many !” 

And, as Alain saw by Irene’s silence that nice- 
ties of French were not at her command, he con- 
tinued : 

“ How many years have you inhabited the Gray 
House?”’ 

“More than four.” 

“Which have appeared as many centuries?” 

“No. For I have worked hard. My father has 
but me to keep his house.” 

“Oh!” said Lavandien, throwing a facile look 
over the house, which was not hard to compre- 
hend. 

“ The house is slender ; so much the more it oc- 
cupies my time,” answered Mademoiselle d’Ober- 
korn. “ I try to manage so that my father, when 
he comes from the field, may not too keenly per- 
ceive all that we lack.” 

“Still,” finely insinuated Alain, “your occupa- 
tion leaves you time for reading. You seem to 
take a delight in this bench.” 

Irene reddened deeply, which made her interloc- 
utor think she was a very sensitive person. 

“Come, come,” he went on, in a paternal tone: 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


n 


Do not imagine I was accusing you of idleness. 
At your age it is natural to seek relaxation. What 
is the name of the book you were reading? May 
I look at it? What? The French Grammar! 
What an original idea!” 

Irene regarded her bench-fellow sideways, shak- 
ing her head to throw aside the cascade of gold 
that tumbled over her eyes — a little childish trait 
she had preserved — and answered : 

“ Do you expect me, at my age, to continue the 
study of the German Grammar?” 

“No,” he replied, glad to see his vis-h-vis could 
give a pointed answer. “ But may I ask you the 
name of your French professor?” 

“ When our misfortunes came upon us, I was un- 
der a Parisian governess, and was beginning to 
speak your language. Here, I was on the point of 
forgetting all I had learned, but, after the lapse of 
a few months, I resumed school attendance. I am 
both the mistress and the pupil.” 

“You will certainly obtain the first prize!” said 
Alain, laughing. “Only I fear the French lan- 
guage may never be of much service to you.” 

A sudden singularly sad expression overclouded 
Irene’s transparent countenance. Once more she 
shook her blonde head, and asked, rather coldly : 

“Do you speak German, monsieur?” 

“No,” answered Alain, without a word of expla- 
nation. 

“ English?” 

“No. The Englishman aggravates me.” 


72 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ Italian?” 

“I despise Italians.” 

“Then, you have to thank my poor French 
Grammar. Had I had the pleasure of this visit a 
year ago, we should hardly have exchanged a doz- 
en words, lacking a mutual tongue.” 

“ Aha, mademoiselle, I see it will be needful to 
adjudge you two prizes instead of one. In logic 
you are absolutly invincible.” 

“ Formerly deemed a horrid study. Do you 
leave again very soon, monsieur?” 

Lavandien had risen, his eyes fixed in the direc- 
tion of the hidden factory. His eyes returned, not 
without a certain sense of usage already, to Irene, 
in a way that seemed to sigh, “So soon!” At the 
end of half an hour he took his leave. He decided 
in his own mind that he would not try too hard to 
turn the head of this compound of Gretchen and 
Amazonian. Still she was amusing — far more so 
than that factotum tattler at “ The Hermitage” — 
even than his master. 

- “ I will come back again soon, for my presence 
seems to give you some faint pleasure.” 

“ Oh, so much 1 I do so love to speak French. 
This has been a morning worth three weeks of 
lonely study.” 

The infant of Nature was slightly indiscreet. To 
punish her Alain launched this Parthian arrow : 

“You never converse with my friend C16guerac?” 

“Because your cousin never comes to see us,” 
answered she with a despondent gesture. “One 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 73 

would think the human race frightened him. For- 
merly we used to see him oftener. We never did 
him any harm. My father esteems him very highly 
indeed, and tells all who will listen that Monsieur 
de Cleguerac will, some day, be the Member of 
Parliament for the district. Poor father ! I see how 
he suffers from the rudeness of an upright man. 
For your friend is good. In his dealings with us 
he is even generous. Do you think we ought to 
invite him, insist on his leaving his solitude? Of- 
ten have I pressed my father to go to ‘The Her- 
mitage ’ ; but he does not like to risk the undertak- 
ing, If you could only get to find some clew ” 

“Yes, yes, mademoiselle, I will try to find out 
his reasons,” said Alain, trying to escape, for at 
any moment now Maurice might put in an appear- 
ance. 

He regained the domicile by a detour, in order 
to put the enemy off the scent, soliloquizing: 

“ Baron von Oberkorn ought to teach his daughter 
a little contemporary history. This child poses 

one with questions All the same, she is quite 

pretty. But what a dress!” 

During these reflections Maurice had come in for 
his early dinner, as he did every day. Passing the 
“ Gray House” on foot because of the declivity, he 
saluted the young girl without looking at her; for 
he was of opinion that one ought not, save under 
compulsion, to look at things or people who dis- 
please or aggravate us. 

But his eyes, falling on the dusty path that led 


74 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


lip to the “Gray House,” fell on the braided yellow 
head of one of those inextinguishable pipe-lights 
experienced smokers use. One does not inhabit 
the prairie for some years without acquiring a cer- 
tain amount of that sagacity and acumen in physi- 
cal signs for which the Indian is so remarkable. 
Now, Maurice knew for a fact that nobody who 
lived within twenty miles carried such fusees. 

“Poor cousin,” he thought, smiling. “ How he 
is dying of lassitude ! I leave him quite too much 
alone.” 

All the same he perceived, on rejoining Alain, 
that the young viscount counted on preserving the 
mystery of his promenade. There was no longer 
any talk of Blackfoot, and the achievement of fur- 
ther mastery over that very restive animal. To 
all appearance, this new enterprise had more inter- 
est for the Parisian than farming and agriculture, 
beetroot-sugar and molasses. To excuse his own 
preoccupation, Alain said: 

“ As I shall be afoot, I cannot follow you. Allow 
me first to make a roadster of yonder ferocious ani- 
mal, and then you shall begin to teach me farm- 
ing.” 

But when Blackfoot had capitulated, which, to 
render justice to his conqueror, came about sooner 
than any one could have anticipated, the first favor 
Alain solicited of his cousin was to accompany him 
toWabigoon. And then he could expedite his let- 
ters. The post-office, in return, overwhelmed him 
with an avalanche of letters and journals the young 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


75 


marquis demolished at his leisure on the ensuing 
morning. The afternoon was occupied in answer- 
ing his correspondents. The next day Alain again 
visited Wabigoon, this time alone. At supper-time 
his cousin hardly knew him, so joyful seemed the 
exile at having replaced the thread that bound him 
to the world. Waistcoat unbuttoned, cravat flying 
loose, hat on the back of his head, he assumed the 
elmentary outward acts and bearing of the genuine 
cowboy. For a trifle he would have put his feet 
upon the table; he perceived that Cleguerac was 
noticing his actions. When it was time to go to 
bed, Alain exclaimed : 

“ Look here, my dear fellow (lighting a pipe pur- 
chased a few hours previously as being character- 
istic of the country) , I do not wish to sneer at agri- 
cultural pursuits, but, for me, the future of the 
Great, North West is in horse-breeding. My path 
is chosen. I will be a breeder. Simone doats on 
horses.” 

''Apropos, have you good news of Mademoiselle 
Montdauphin?” 

“The best of news,” cried Alain, hardly having 
understood the question. 


VIL 


From that day the young cousins lived like a 
married couple a la mode, seeing each other rarely 
except at meal-times. Clegudrac, overdone with 
work in the supervision of the farm, did not com- 
plain of the ‘greater liberty thus left him. Alain 
had asked and obtained the post of director-general 
of the equine department — a position which, save 
in the case of the breaking out of bounds of the 
boarders, might pass for honorary employment. 
None the less had he written home that he was in 
charge, all alone, of caring for, feeding, guarding, 
and perpetuating a family of one hundred horses, 
and thus accounting for the falling off in number 
and in size of his letters. If we must confess it, his 
Parisian correspondence, that is, his correspondence 
with the Paris of the Countess de Gravino and Si- 
mone caused him some embarrassment. To have 
to repeat to one’s betrothed, in satisfactory words, 
that one is dying with impatience to marry, but 
hasn’t the least idea when or where that marriage 
may take place, is but a thankless task. But to 
prove serious love, actions speak louder than words. 
Simone was greatly moved when she reflected what 
superhuman work her lover had undertaken for her 
sake. 

Thanks to the happiness she experienced in feel- 
76 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


77 


ing herself so well loved, thanks also to an invita- 
tion she and her mother received to spend a few 
weeks in the Countess de Gra vino’s country house, 
always full of charming society, the end of summer 
and commencement of autumn passed pleasantly 
enough. The countess sang the praises of “ The 
Hermitage” and Maurice more than once or twice. 

As for young Alain, Heaven shield us from say- 
ing that he thought less and less of his lady-love; 
but it is certain that at this time he seemed to share 
his family’s procrastinating ways. Without boast- 
ing, we may say that he is becoming as good a 
judge of horses as his cousin. He rides into Wabi- 
goon now, as formerly across the Bois, without, 
however, meeting so many people he knows upon 
the way. 

That town in embryo — and planks — amused him. 
He had found there one of those universal shops, 
which, under the name of stores, furnish Canadian 
colonists, according to their wants, with clothes or 
drugs, pianos or plates, corsets or cooking-stoves. 
The owner, one of the personages of Wabigoon, 
got on the sunny side of the young man less by 
speaking to him in broken French than instilling 
into Lavandien’s head the idea that he was learn- 
ing English. 

“Such a store would make its fortune in Paris,” 
said the latter one day to Maurice. “The man 
keeps English cloths my tailor never has been able 
to match. The deuce, he is choked on both sides 
by those beggarly Germans!” 


78 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Cleguerac had a fancy to tell him that he had 
that very morning found a yellow fusee on the 
rather Germanic entrance to the ‘‘Gray House.” 
But he had resolved to begin to seriously study his 
friend’s character — a medley of good qualities and 
childish weaknesses. 

“ When we are the masters of the country, we 
will open Assiniboine to French imports,” said he. 
“Till then let us bow the head.” 

Nevertheless Alain became quite popular in 
Wabigoon. The proprietor of the store had ob- 
tained his partial confidence one day, without warn- 
ing him that he was worming an interview out of 
him ; for the jam-merchant was at the same time 
proprietor and manager of the Assiniboine Star. 
For the first time in his life Alain knew the joy of 
seeing his name in capitals at the head of a news- 
paper column. Receiving it at “The Hermitage,” 
he placed one copy out of two purchased in Mau- 
rice’s hands. We may guess for whom the other 
was destined, be it understood, in a sealed envelope. 
We shall see that the latter precaution was insuffi- 
cient. 

The interview, which Cleguerac read out loud in 
French, would not have given the father the same 
pleasure it gave the son, gently mouthed by the 
partial reader. The Wabigoon journal recounted 
the arrival of the Viscount de Lavandien on the 
banks of Moose Brook, “ where he is going to set 
us all a new example of the courage and taste for 
colonial enterprise that distinguish the coming 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


79 


French race.” Already, said the Star^ the new- 
comer has associated himself with one of his old 
friends in the management of “The Hermitage.” 
At the same time, this was but the lifting of the 
curtain. The viscount’s intention in coming over 
was to marry and purchase a magnificent domain, 
without being able to say exactly whether it was 
with a domain or a farm he wished to start. But 
after a few details thrown in by the reporter on the 
physical and moral qualifications and financial re- 
sources of the future hero, it was hinted that nei- 
ther one nor the other of his enterprises would hang 
fire long. 

Cleguerac translated the article without the least 
bitterness, although his own name was not even 
mentioned. Alain, showing his own satisfaction, 
had the good taste to show regret for this omission. 

“ The matter surprises me less than yourself,” his 
cousin answered. “ I must take into consideration 
the fact that I once drew editorial blood through 
the nose, outside the Wabigoon Club, in the days 
when men had not yet left off fighting me. Yon- 
der brave man is as tough as cartilage.” 

Cleguerac remained no less unmoved when one 
fine day Alain appeared before him in a veritable 
cowboy’s outfit ; Mexican saddle, plaited lasso, 
leather pantaloons, huge straw hat, and bowie knife 
at belt. The proprietor of the store handled the 
camera in his spare moments, and had taken some 
photographs of the viscount in his novel get-up 
which suited him admirably. Simone, when, by a 


8o 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


roundabout journey she should receive the picture 
and newspaper article, would experience delight 
attempered with a little sadness. She was gayly 
amusing herself at the countess’ house, having just 
taken the leading role in a drawing-room comedy ; 
the house was full of pleasant and attentive visitors. 

“ My next autumn will be a slightly different 
‘season’ from this,” said Simone with a brave and 
graceful little smile. 

“ Marry, marry always,” said the lovely Mathilde. 
“ If I had sought to split my head by deciphering 
the mysteries of the future ! But what a pity your 
husband, while sending his own photograph, did 
not send his friend’s.” 

All this time the nights were lengthening at 
“ The Hermitage,” and the first white swirls of snow 
betrayed the northern latitude. For Maurice it 
was the striking hour, the solemn time of gather- 
ing in the beet-root crop. Already the factory 
chimney vomited swart smoke by night and day. 
For weeks to come the boiling-pans, the simmering- 
pans, the vacuum-pans would be in full play. 

The sugar factory had interested Lavandien 
during just one hour, but such scorching and mo- 
notonous manipulation fatigued him at the start. 
So his fortune and imagination were not there. 
Everybody to his business — his was that of horse- 
breeding. Unfortunately the paddock did not give 
him a great deal of occupation. In his equine re- 
public the duty of the president was simply to see 
the citizens browse from morn to noon, and noon 


LOVE KNOWS.no law. 


8l 


to night. Happy republic! And Alain, in order 
to behold his horses feeding, had need of a pair of 
spurs. As soon as he came within five hundred 
yards or so the usual stampede began. Let it be 
confessed that Blackfoot, nobly trained and admir- 
ably behaved, was his master’s glory and his con- 
solation. 

But in time a Parisian gets tired of laying down 
the law in the desert and of prairie equitation. 
Wabigoon at length grew tedious. Irene von Ober- 
korn, when Alain, overcome with tedium, took his 
usual seat beside her, could talk of nobody but Mau- 
rice. And Maurice, when by chance his cousin 
broached their pretty neighbor’s name, had a way 
of silently pulling his mustache that might cause 
one to think him better informed than he chose to 
appear. To tell the solemn truth, the poor vis- 
count was becoming bored to the verge of insanity. 

Nevertheless, the many labors of the owner of 
The Hermitage” had not prevented him from do- 
ing all his duty as a host. Alain had gone a-hunt- 
ing once or twice with little sport or profit. He 
had accompanied Clegu^rac to the houses of neigh- 
bors who lived twelve and fifteen miles away, who, 
with their wives and daughters, spoke English at 
him for two hours at a time, until he felt that he 
should like to beat them. Then the two friends 
went on a visit to the Indian Reservation. Every 
one of the entertaining features of the country had 
been done to death — the cold season was well upon 
them. Thi© question of marriage, alas! had been 
0 


82 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


shelved for the time. What was there now to do? 
How pass the frozen days ? How beat an honor- 
able retreat? 

But Alain conducted his campaign on two sound 
mottoes. The first was: to gain time. The sec- 
ond : to seize unexpected advantages. This latter 
maxim, so often justified in practice, was going to 
be proved once more, and that right soon. Alain’s 
hesitation was soon to be a thing of the past. This 
is how the unexpected made its bow : 

Wabigoon was all agog. It was the day of the 
grand political banquet organized by twelve or 
twenty farmers of the district. Alain was an in- 
vited guest, so much may be supposed, although 
his ideas upon the inner working of prairie politics 
were in a glorious muddle. 

“ Be ready for a toast in your honor, and reply 
to it,” warned Maurice. 

“ In French?” 

“ The deuce ! no one is bound to do impossibili- 
ties. I will translate your answer for them.” 

The town was full of animation, for, as the banquet 
was accompanied by a ball, lady farmers and their 
fascinating daughters, blooming with health rather 
than glowing in silk attire, had accompanied their 
fathers, husbands, sweethearts into town. Waiting 
for the hour of the roast ham and beef, and speechi- 
fying, they were crowding in and round the stores. 
The men were buying whittling-knives or daily 
papers. The youths wore paper collars over flan- 
nel shirts. Substantial housewives were renewing 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


83 


their supplies of candies and peanuts. A few coun- 
try dudes had purchased dogskin gloves. Pell- 
mell among the ladies, a couple of Indians, who 
looked extremely unhappy in their short Euro- 
pean frocks and savage continuations, waited pa- 
tiently to be served with a few ounces of tobacco, 
without altogether losing sight of their hardy little 
horses dozing outside, tied to the roof-posts by 
their scarlet bridle-straps. 

The two hotels of Wabigoon, light and primitive 
structures, whose chambers were separated from 
each other by walls of stout brown paper, had their 
share in the honor and glory and profit of the day ; 
the ball had fallen to the lot of one, the banquet to 
the other. Maurice and his guest had just de- 
scended at the latter, ringed in already by a throng 
of anxious citizens, their vehicles making an im- 
posing show. Irene von Oberkorn was lean- 
ing on the balustrade of the veranda, awaiting the 
advent of the cousins, with the same mild and pa- 
tient gaze she was wont to wear at the “Gray 
House.” Apparently the store had no attractions 
for her, or, which was, alas! more probable, her 
slender purse did not warrant her in braving its 
seductions. Always the same antique robe, save 
that to-day a sash of white muslin marred the pretty 
wave-lines of her figure. Atrocious gloves that had 
one day been glac^, their fingers shrunk with age, 
hid her well-formed hands, that were a mile too 
small for them. 

Ah I a rose is blossoming at her throat, the only 


84 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


rose of autumn that stern frost had spared. But 
youth and pleasure hung twin roses in her cheeks, 
as she replied to their gay salutations. 

While Maurice was hitching his horse, Alain 
could not refuse the opportunity of talking with 
Irene, who was making signals to him as to an old 
friend. 

“This little German girl hesitates at nothing,” 
said the viscount to his friend by way of an excuse. 

Cleguerac, without seeking to hide a slight 
shoulder-shrug, retorted: 

“ Do not act the boy.” 

Irene stretched her hand to the marquis, who 
was obliged to take it. 

“ How late you are,” she said. 

“Is it not rather you who are early? What are 
you going to do with yourself till the dancing com- 
mences?” 

“I dine with Minnie.” 

“Who is Miss Minnie?” 

“The pastor’s daughter; we love each other very 
dearly. Let me present you. It is said she dances 
very well indeed. As for me, I am not so clever ; 
it is my first ball. But, all the same, you will 
teach me to dance, won’t you?” 

“Ah!” said Alain without a direct answer, “this 
is your first bow to society?” 

“ I was sixteen years old this morning. Would 
you not think they were giving the ball expressly 
in my honor? My heart is leaping with pleasure 
in my breast.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


85 


The exaggeration of this sentiment was not the 
Parisian’s fault. He was not talking to Simone. 
Nevertheless he regarded this descendant of a noble 
race almost with emotion, this poor girl denied ev- 
ery worldly advantage, whose youth and beauty 
were eternally buried, probably, in the silent prai- 
rie, now chanting her artless enjoyment like the 
untaught, melodious chaffinch. 

When we are neighbors, Simone will know how 
to remake her a good old dress or two without hurt- 
ing her feelings.” 

Cleguerac had disappeared to deliver his horse 
to the safe-keeping of the stable-boy. For the first 
time since the beginning of the conversation, Irene 
turned her eyes on Alain otherwise than at insen- 
sible intervals. 

“Here I am sure of at least one partner,” said 
she. “ But I should like to know if Monsieur — if 

Monsieur de Clegu6rac Do you think he would 

invite me too?'" 

Cleguerac dance with a German — “ a little circus 
apprentice !” 

Alain, pushed forward by chivalric principles, 
wished to save Irene from self-deception if pos- 
sible. 

“ I don’t know very much about it,” he answered, 
making a wry face. 

Suddenly she became as gloomy as she had 
hitherto been joyous. The bird no longer even 
twittered. Ah, this unfortunate Parisian observer ! 

“ He has been speaking of me?” she asked, great- 


86 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


ly discouraged. “ Heavens, could I but tell wliat 
be thinks of me !” 

He thinks — he thinks you are a child.” 

“I am as big as you are,” said Irene von Ober- 
korn, drawing herself up. 

She was right. But it is a great mistake for a 
woman to try and prove herself in the right by 
showing she is taller than her interlocutor. In such 
cases, on the contrary, the clever ones lie low. 
But imagine trying to make Irene into a blue- 
stocking ! 

Suddenly the viscount felt in an easier frame of 
mind to administer to this strange girl a few drops 
of the vinegar of truth. 

“You have a woman’s height and figure,” lower- 
ing his eyes severely to the ground, “ but it cannot 
be said that you are altogether in costume.” 

The bright blue eyes grew dull, then veiled, then 
full to overflowing. Two full round tears forced 
themselves through the golden lids. Alain’s honor 
was more than satisfied. As, after all, our valiant 
youth had old and honorable blood in his veins, he 
was ashamed to have shown such a heavy hand, 
and now cast about for the best way of alleviating 
the distress that he had caused. 

“Forgive me!” he cried. “ On my cousin’s part 
I hereby invite you to the first dance. Are you 
still vexed with me?” 

Perhaps Irene Oberkorn was about to reply 
proudly that she did not pick up her cavaliers 
per procurationem. But Maurice’s voice was now 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


s; 


heard calling his companion. Both hastened to 
take their places at the political banquet, while poor 
Irene remained seated in solitary state, turning her 
mother’s little gold watch, her only trinket, her 
sole fortune, sadly in her hands. 

The tables groaned beneath a mass of solid food 
more imposing for weight than variety, colossal in 
dimensions. Two huge hams, two gigantic tur- 
keys, two enormous joints of roast beef, loomed up, 
so many kitchen phenomena. Lavandien congrat- 
ulated the poor of the parish, in an aside, for an 
aftermath of butcher-meat that would feed them 
for days. But as soon as the company had sung 
“God save the Queen,” all in chorus, and the presi- 
dent had cut up one of these mountains of meat, an 
operation that was continuous till the beginning of 
the speech-making, twenty-four pairs of jaws went 
to work in such an appalling silence, unbroken save 
as the champing of many bits, that the platefuls 
began to vanish like a midsummer fog at sunrise. 
The viscount said to Cl^gu^rac: 

“ I hope, for the benefit of these poor fellows, 
that there will be a second course.” 

“No,” retorted Maurice, “you know a politician 
always quits with an appetite for 7norey 

Nevertheless the stance seemed to Lavandien 
a little long. His cousin, seated on his right, talked 
custom-house tariffs with the candidate at the. next 
provincial election. To the left Alain perceived 
the old colonel. Chief of the Reserves, who spoke 
two languages only, both equally unknown to the 


88 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Parisian ; one of the Indian tongue, and English. 
Better to explain the matter, we may say the vet- 
eran spoke neither, for he sat carelessly absorbing 
monuments of meat, washed down by countless cups 
of caf^s-au-lait. A phrase from his direction would 
have proved no less startling than a vocal reply 
from Cleguerac’s beetroot-crushing machine. 

Happily for Alain, he was somewhat amused by 
several bouts of conversation from the lips of a 
gentleman neither old nor young, who would come, 
ever and anon, to repose his meagre person on the 
bench, on the space between the colonel and La- 
vandien. This personage, to give him his exact 
due, was no more nor less than a waiter ; but ser- 
vice, reduced to its first principles in this establish- 
ment, gave him a certain leisure. By this he prof- 
ited for many consecutive minutes, flitting hither 
and thither, now swallowing a mouthful of coffee, 
now tearing between his fingers at a bit of turkey, 
and, which seemed to give him more pleasure than 
all, conversing with Lavandien. He spoke almost 
all European languages, gave himself out as a 
Hungarian, and recounted how, arriving one morn- 
ing at Wabigoon to make his fortune, he made his 
debut in the hotel to which his only recommenda- 
tion was his manners. This kind of “ character” 
would have caused a little hesitation in most places, 
but it was otherwise in a hotel upon the prairie. 
Alain asked himself what this very comet-like per- 
son could have originally been: an assassin in 
search of a less dangerous business to life and 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


89 


limb, or an honest inventor victimized by fate, even 
in his physiognomy, at whose approach one felt 
that silver should be put away and gold entombed. 
He was drawn away from the contemplation of this 
problem by the very first toast. The Hungarian 
had just placed upon the table, by special authority 
of the lieutenant-governor, a number of whiskey 
bottles, rigorously “counted out” as “one among 
two people.” Lavandien, for two months deprived 
of the taste of alcoholic liquor, foolishly tossed off 
a goblet of the potent fluid, but had no wish to con- 
tinue. But the colonel had, and theirs was about 
the first flask to stand empty. Yet one could see 
that the more intoxicated of these very ill-matched 
boon-companions was not the colonel. 

From that moment the old officer talked as much 
as he had a mind to, even more than Alain wanted, 
for he, too, was in the state that asks a confidential 
listener. Everything causes us to imagine that he 
now poured into the old man’s senseless ears se- 
crets he should have carried with him to the grave. 
But as what they said one to another was equal gib- 
berish to each, one must wink at a moment of weak- 
ness that broke no man or woman’s reputation. 
Never did one behold two conversationalists more 
enchanted with each other, for they did not per- 
ceive the fundamental impossibility of a misunder- 
standing. 

Suddenly Cleguerac pressed his cousin’s elbow. 
“Attention! they are about to drink your health.” 

At the same time, with a hand of iron, he fast- 


90 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


ened his friend to his seat, for the toastee must re- 
main seated while the toasters, on foot, proclaim 
him *‘a jolly good fellow,” to the tune of Tra, la, 
la^ la^ la^ la. 

When the air had ceased, Maurice loosened hold 
of Lavandien, who shot up like a spring, in an- 
swer to the toast. 

He began correctly by the expression of his grat- 
itude, and the pleasant reception he had met with 
in this truly hospitable country. But soon the young 
orator left far behind the limits he had set himself 
in the cooler atmosphere of the study. His impro- 
visation broadened out, scintillating as he pro- 
ceeded. He painted in doleful colors the dull lot 
of the unfortunate people doomed to live on the 
exhausted soil and in the corrupt civilization of the 
ancient world. As for him, the Great North West, 
which he was beginning to love like a second 
mother, would evermore count him within the fold 
of her citizens. It was there he prayed to pass his 
existence, there he wished to die, after having 
grafted a number of Lavandien slips, regenerated 
Lavandiens, to perpetuate the old name 

Nobody could have said what Mademoiselle de 
Montdauphin would have thought of this extraordi- 
nary peroration, but, luckily, she was not there to 
appreciate it. Those who heard the speech in its 
entirety — for Cleguerac, in his translation, took no 
pains to soften it down — showed immense enthusi- 
asm ; above all, such as had a daughter on the mar- 
riage-market, or a farm to sell. Three solid rounds 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


91 


of shouts and applause caused the window-glass 
and rafters to ring again, and three or four matrons 
who had glided into the hall to hear their husbands 
speak retired crushed, in order to inform the young 
ladies of their acquaintance that it was essential 
that evening not only to dance but absolutely to 
sparkle. 

Alas! at this instant the unexpected swooped 
down on the procedings in the form of a telegraph 
boy. Alain felt they were slipping a yellow enve- 
lope into his hands. Mechanically he opened it, 
unfolded the dispatch, threw his eyes over it, and 
then, handing it to Cleguerac, said : 

“ I don’t understand a word of English. Can 
you decipher the signature?” 

“My friend, it is not English,” said Maurice. 
“ As for the signature, it is extremely legible : La- 
vandien^ 

Alain bounded a foot into the air and came back 
to the earth as sober a man as there was in the 
room. After reading it he handed the telegram to 
Clegudrac. His hands trembled ; a cold sweat, the 
reaction of surprise, stood on his forehead; groans 
issued from his lips, and, after groans, a brace or 
two of very palpable oaths. 

“Good. That is it, then!” answered Maurice, 
after having perused the two lines. “Courage! 
Your ships are burned behind you; one will swim 
the better! You see, you have all the world before 
you. To-morrow ’twill be daylight. Come and 
dance!” 


92 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


The viscount looked hard at his cousin in order 
to see whether the latter were not now intoxicated. 

“Dance!” said he. “The devil take me if I 
have heart for dancing. For the love of heaven, 
take me back to ‘The Hermitage,' my dear Mau- 
rice. And let the traitor have a care, as soon as I 
get to know hi^ name.” 


VIII. 

There is no item of our daily lives that shall not 
be known. 

One cannot too often read this maxim over to 
people of small discretion, chiefly wives who wish to 
deceive their husbands, or, as everybody knows is 
much more difficult, husbands seeking to betray 
their wives. The Viscount de Lavandien only 
wished to deceive his father, and, as he deceived 
him from afar off, our wilful youth thought he had 
no exposure to dread. 

He imagined, moreover, with some show of 
sense, that his affair with Simone was hardly known 
to a dozen intimates, himself included. Now it 
was currently spoken of in the Countess de Gra vi- 
no’s salons, in those of Pere Lavandien, and half a 
dozen others. At the club people were willing to 
bet against the marriage, but there were no back- 
ers. The Count de Lavandien, however, appar- 
ently took but little heed when they told him of his 
silly son’s caprice, which caused him to have it 
dinned into his ears every night by a group of men 
arrived at the mature age when disagreeable items 
of news have all the spice. 

This sympathetic group was dispersed about the 
smoking-room, the day before the Wabigoon ban- 
quet. Considering the season, there were not many 
93 


94 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


present. Pere Alain entered, and one of his col- 
leagues, a collector of scandal, asked him what was 
going to become of his precious offspring. 

“My son? He is touring through the United 
States. He is amusing himself ; he rides on horse- 
back with the daughters of millionaires. Travel is 
the very making of youth.” 

“ They say he leaves a charming fiancee behind 
him.” 

“Oh! a fiancee y simply an idyl, a sketch of an 
idyl, as says Lheretier. Our young cavalier had it 
in his head to carry off a certain lady fair, one 
evening after a ball. A very charming girl, but 
without a sou to her name. I had the ill taste to 
break out laughing in his face, which plunged him 
in a savage fit of indignation. Seeing him ready 
to do foolish things, I said : Listen to the choice I 
give you. Pack your valise immediately for New 
York, with all due scope and accommodation, or go 
into the country, without a horse to your name. 
To Tattersall’s with your stable — two-sou cigars to 
smoke. Do your hunting with a spaniel, unless 
you prefer fishing.” 

“And the young man chose the valise?” 

“Yes, with the accompanying accommodation. 
He told me he yielded to force, but that he would 
love the damsel all his life, and that he would sur- 
vive the last of his race. ‘Will you lay a wager on 
it?’ said I. These ragamuffins think they are fin- 
ished cavaliers at twenty-three.” 

“Your wife should mourn her first-born.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


95 


“ Only with one eye. Her desire is just as great 
as mine to have grandchildren in the consulates or 
the prefectures. But I know my man. We shall 
see him again — and soon.” 

“You don’t read the newspapers very much, do 
you, Lavandien?” said a member of the club who 
had entered in time to catch the last phrase. 

At the same time the old bore handed the count a 
scarce dry journal, where Alain’s father had the sat- 
isfaction of reading the article from the Assiniboine 
Star, well and duly translated, and now published 
under the title : “ The Gentlemen of France in the 
Great North West.” 

The blow was a serious one ; none the less for 
being received in public. M. de Lavandien swore 
and pounded the sofa with his fist, while his com- 
forters pounded him with admirable advice. One 
recommended that he should give his plain and 
plump consent to the marriage with Mademoiselle 
Montdauphin. Another, who had brought an atlas 
from the library, looked up Wabigoon and mapped 
out a plan of campaign. 

“You are too kind, too kind,” growled the new 
Geronte. “Were you in my place would you make 
the voyage?” 

A third was in favor of the intercession or inter- 
vention of the colonial minister. But was a colony 
in question ? What was meant by the Great North 
West? Nobody at the club could solve the riddle. 
Wabigoon obstinately remained invisible upon the 
map. 


96 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ Where in the dickens did the monkey find the 
money to buy a farm?’' groaned the father, wildly 
clutching his hair. - “ And may the devil take me 
if I should have thought that empty-headed chit 
capable of going into exile for such an imbecile as 
my son.” 

“In your place,” said somebody, “I should seek 
information at the newspaper office.” 

This time the advice was, by unanimous consent, 
deemed fit and proper. The Count de Lavandien 
seized his hat and jumped into a vehicle, accom- 
panied by two friends who had nothing else to do. 
At the newspaper office they found only the usual 
boy, who, smelling a duel or a beating for some- 
body, during the course of the evening, informed 
his master that a suspicious visitor would be there 
upon the morrow, and recommending certain pre- 
cautions to be taken. 

M. de Lavandien regained his domicile in a de- 
plorable state. Happily the countess, a woman of 
intellect, put her hand on the key of the situation, 
and, losing no time in groans, sat down at a table 
and wrote a careful cablegram, of such virility as 
to sober up instantly a young man six thousand 
miles away — as we have seen. One may ask one’s 
self if the application v/ere not as powerful in its 
way as the colonel’s whiskey. Such is the power 
of words and the right knowledge of their use. 

All the same, the dispatch was not sent off that 
evening. At the telegraph-office they would not 
accept it, owing to its being insufficiently ad- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 97 

dressed. In wliat part of North America was 
Wabigoon? 

“ Try and be good for something,” said the count- 
ess to her husband, “ and to-morrow morning 
learn the locality of this city with the barbarous 
name. By that time I shall have ascertained the 
thoughts of Mamma Montdauphin. I have my own 
police.” 

The poor count, who hated going out before the 
middle of the day, at 9 o’clock found himself in the 
newspaper office, with the article he had by heart, 
having read and reperused it almost all night long. 
After being kept waiting two hours, he saw the 
arrival of a secretary, who, disavowing all respon- 
sibility, took refuge behind a Canadian journal 
from which he was copying a demi-page. 

“ Well, then,” asked the unfortunate father, “it 
seems I must seek explanations at Quebec?” 

“ Hardly so far,” responded his interlocutor, with 
a smile. “ The Canadian journal from which we 
reproduced the article is printed at the Batignolles.” 

Indeed, M. de Lavandien discovered the “organ” 
in question in a court leading out of the Rue des 
Dames. There all was confusion worse confounded. 
Whether he explained himself confusedly or the 
Canadian employee — who had a Bordeaux accent 
— lacked intelligence, the interview was carried 
under a false flag. The young man thought his 
visitor wanted himself to buy a farm in the Great 
North West. 

“ It is the finest country in the world for a serious 
7 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


colonist,” protested the agent. “ It remains to de- 
cide what line you mean to take up, wheat culture, 
the lumber business, cattle or horse raising. Do 
not forget, too, that there are valuable mines.” 

At the same time he put under the old gentle- 
man’s nose a map embracing a surface equal to 
nearly half Europe. The map was studded with 
little squares that gave it the look of coarse canvas. 
Each little square represented a “township” of 
sixty square miles. 

“ How many lots does M. le Comte wish to buy?” 

Imagine Moliere’s Tome employing his eloquence 
in tr3dng to sell a galley to old Geronte, after the 
latter’s celebrated s:ene with Scapin. 

It was only by a narrow chance that Geronte did 
did not strangle the secretary, but he finished up 
by listening. One might go back from the Pari- 
sian journal to its Canadian brother of the Batign- 
olles, from that to a Montreal paper, from Mon- 
treal to Winnipeg, from Winnipeg to Wabigoon. 
The position of Wabigoon was ascertained, also 
that it possessed telegraphic accommodation. But 
the Gascon observed that the radius of the office 
might extend many miles in certain directions, 
which would render the further dispatch of the 
telegram somewhat problematical. 

Nevertheless, as soon as madame had reeeived 
the count’s report, she expedited the unhappy dis- 
patch whose arrival the reader has already wit- 
nessed, which was couched in these terms, all the 
more terrible for their startling brevity : 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


99 


Allowance suppressed. All pecuniary engagements 
disavowed. Measures being devised for your disinheri- 
tance. Lavandien.” 

Rarely had the marvellous powers of electricity 
received more startling demonstration. Some hours 
after the receipt of these lines at the wicket in the 
Avenue Marceau, the pale reflection of a crescent 
moon guided the rapid progress of a buggy across 
the prairie. Maurice with one hand lightly guided 
the buggy, while the other arm was thrown round 
his friend’s shoulders to preserve the unhappy man 
from falling, thus led terribly by the flowery path 
of hope to the verge of ruin. The journey was ac- 
complished without a word on either side, without 
other incident than Annie’s escapades, who would 
sometimes put one foot in a gopher-hole. Alain 
felt the refreshing air of night. Hardly had he 
strength enough to grasp his friend’s hand and 
murmur in a muffled voice : 

^‘To-morrow we will talk, unless I am happy 
enough never to wake again.” 

“Poor Simone,” sighed Maurice, as he went to 
bed. 

During all that time, at the Wabigoon ball, the 
young colonists in their shirt-sleeves, with their 
lady friends in prints and satinettes, gave them- 
selves up to joy. Only a certain blonde Gretchen, 
who had refused every invitation, remained in her 
chair, her great blue eyes fixed on the door by 
which he was to enter. 


lOO 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“One would say you were shivering,” asked her 
father, helping her to descend from their vehicle 
in front of the “Gray House.” 

“ It is nothing,” answered she. “ On the prairie 
the dawn is always chilly.” 

Irene, before entering their humble lodge, gazed 
at the promise of the day already pink. 

“Luck to you,” sighed she, “dawn of my seven- 
teenth year.” 

The morning advanced, and our lightning-struck 
hero woke from his nightmare-haunted sleep. 

“What are you doing there?” grumbled he, as 
Rabat, planted in the doorway, stood staring at the 
awakened sleeper. 

For all answer the old sailor pointed to the un- 
touched breakfast-tray. But little did Lavandien 
think of breakfasting. Like all weak spirits, he 
wrestled painfully to discover the secondary cause 
of the catastrophe, in preference to trying to over- 
come its dread effects. 

He had thought but for one thing: to unmask 
the traitor who had told the count of his son’s visit 
to “The Hermitage.” Fixed in his seat, with the 
dread aspect of a judge about to sentence a man to 
be hanged, he cried: 

“ Listen to me and answer, if you can, without a 
lie. To whom did you write to betray my pres- 
ence in this infernal country?” 

Rabat clapped his cap upon his head as though 
he had been shot. He seemed frozen with terror 
and stammered; 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


lOI 


“ What does monsieur say?” 

I wish to say that all the world ought to believe 
I am in New York; and now my father hears that 
I am at 'The Hermitage.’ That’s what I want to 
say. I know the spy who has undone me. An- 
swer me one word, and I will denounce thee to 
Zelie!” 

“Monsieur,” said Rabat, who was as pale as new 
linen, “ on a sailor’s word of honor, I don’t know 
how to write. But what reason had monsieur to 
think ” 

“No questions. Pack my trunks. I leave to- 
night.” 

“ Ah, monsieur !” said the sailor, gaining the 
doorway, “there will be two to go. That which 
has happened to one may happen to another. Yes, 
sir, there are spies, and not far off either. I always 
said there were. German dogs!” 

Maurice entered from his work sooner than usual, 
and went in to his cousin, whom he found with only 
one shoe on, plunged in reflection. 

“Look here,” said he, taking a seat, “it is no 
time to lose your head. I have been thinking over 
your affairs all the morning. First of all, one ques- 
tion. You are determined, still, to marry Made- 
moiselle Montdauphin?” 

The young viscount forgot his miserable estate 
in an outbreak of wounded pride. 

“ The question amounts to this : A man pledges 
his word. Do you, or do you not, expect him to 
perform it?” 


102 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“My dear cousin,” answered Maurice, “there are 
some words we must not speak. If, in a moment 
of excitement, you had sworn to kill me, I should 
not hesitate to advise you to perjure yourself.” 

“ It was not to kill her I promised Simone!” 

“Ah, my friend, in the days when I inhabited 
the great world, I assisted at a good many fine mar- 
riages that were no better than assassinations.” 

“ As for me, to listen to you one would think it 
was a question of an ordinary marriage for me. I 
love Mademoiselle de Montdauphin seriously, sin- 
cerely, for my whole life. I could never be happy 
without her.” 

“ This is a great deal. All the same, it is even 
more necessary to be assured beforehand that you 
would be happy with her, and — allow me to add 
this little phrase — that she would be happy with 
you.” 

Alain only answered with an angry look. 

“ Well,” returned Cleguerac, “ let us say no more. 
Pass we to ways and means. As I told you last 
night, your vessels are burned behind you ; and 
here are you and your wife, condemned, willy- 
nilly, to a prairie life. Let us scan the schedule 
of acounts. Assets, nil, naturally. Prospects ” 

“ I only regret one thing,” with an accent of con- 
viction not yet shown, “ not having debts amount- 
ing to five hundred thousand francs. My father 
would have had the pleasure of’paying them ! But 
I don’t owe a cent. We go to the same tailor and 
shirtmaker, and he sends in only one bill.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


103 


“ Excellent system. Yon will regret it elsewhere 
but here. But, so far as I can see, your cargo of 
effects will last you ten years. Therefore, so far 
as you are concerned, Dr. — Cr. = o. It is not 
enough to establish one’s self on ; but with ten thou- 
sand francs you could buy a thousand acres of land, 
and, however small the dowry the lady would bring, 
it would, no doubt, suffice. Only the dowry would 
come after the marriage, the marriage only after 
the usual formalities, which, in your case, could 
not now be gone through before you are twenty-five 
years of age.” 

Lavandien at these words broke out : 

'' Diantre! cousin, the ‘usual formalities’! This 
is the tenth time you have spoken of the matter as 
a thing of naught. She is lovely — and I love her. 
Stay, do you know Prevanes, that poor devil, to- 
day a consul in China? Well, he was married, 
after waiting, and — the usual formalities. Com- 
plete mess of it, naturally. Do you know what 
happened next? In less than two years his father 
died.” 

“ Of chagrin?” 

“No; in a railway accident. And afterward it 
was found that the elder Prevanes had just had 
time to will away his fortune, leaving the young- 
housekeeper a few well-chosen maxims, and the 
castle of the same name, carefully stripped bare of 
every single acre that surrounded it. Do you under- 
stand such legislation? The law gives me the 
right to marry without my father’s consent. But 


io4 love knows no laW. 

it gives my father the right to watch me die of 
hunger, unless I marry with it. Is not this mon- 
strous?” 

Maurice’s speaking physiognomy was a study. 
In one moment it passed from friendly preoccupa- 
tion to surprise, from surprise to discouragement, 
from discouragement to consternation. Alain did 
not notice the changes his recital had wrought. 
He continued, wrapt up in his subject: 

“You see, when one has said ‘usual formalities,’ 
all has not been said.” 

“No,” agreed Maurice, pulling out his watch, 
“but I should like to know what has become of 
Monsieur Rabat. Are you not dying of hunger?” 

At the same time he gave a formidable bang on 
the boarding, for he felt the necessity of beating 
something or somebody. The sailor appeared, and 
finding his master, as he called it, in an evil fettle, 
gave as an excuse for delaying the dinner that he 
had been engagd with M. de Lavandien’s baggage. 

Once more alone with his cousin Maurice asked : 

“You are going?” 

Alain murmured something, finishing by the 
avowal that he did not think it wise to infuriate his 
father.” 

“By the devil and his horns!” cried Cleguerac, 
“ I think you might have told me this before. For 
the last hour I have been manoeuvring to get into 
a position to offer you the price of an estate !” 

“You, too, against me !” sighed the viscount. 
“ Ah ! I have never had a chance I” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. lO^ 

In fact lie seemed in despair, so much so as to 
show overflowing eyes, for he wept with some fa- 
cility. That was one of his peculiarities that had 
led Simone off her feet, incapable, as many women 
are, of beholding a man cry without their heart 
being troubled. Respecting his grief, Maurice be- 
gan softly: 

“ I do not wish to contradict you, but it seems to 
me the real person who ‘has no chance’ is Made- 
moiselle Simone.” 

The young viscount began to sob. To give him 
time to recover, his cousin continued : 

“ On the contrary, that which causes the present 
trouble is having too many chances. In the first 
place you are the son of a rich father. Then you 
were born in the happy land where the father is 
held bound, by custom, to make his son a wealthy 
man, allowing always that the son’s an upright 
fellow. Your father has no right to impoverish 
you, whether for his own amusement, or in cross- 
speculations, or by building a hospital, or by giv- 
ing you more brothers and sisters than is suitable, 
after the age when such extravagances are tolerated. 
Up till now, all, you observe, is well. But when 
the same father, with inexorable logic, is unwilling 
to see you impoverish yourself by wedding a young 
lady without fortune, you cry out at the top of your 
voice. Look you, my dear fellow, you are hardly 
fair. Do you know what people would say of your 
father if he allowed you to make a love-match? 
They would say he was a fool. In such a case I have 


o6 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


seen some creep round to the common-sense opin- 
ion of the father. Well, at the banquet yesterday 
evening you made an impassioned eulogy in favor 
of numerous posterity.” 

The viscount wept no more. A sharp sting of 
ridicule was poisoning the bruise of his chagrin. 
Seeking an answer, breakfast was announced, in- 
terrupting the conversation and bringing it back to 
more ordinary channels while the sailor was within 
earshot. But as soon as they were disembarrassed 
of his presence, Alain took up the order of the day. 

“ What an upset all this is for you ! Thanks to 
me, you will be up half the night.” 

“ It is not your fault there is only one train for 
New York every twenty-four hours. Naturally 
3 ^ou return to New York?” 

“ It seems my destiny. From there I cable to 
my father, supplementing my cable to him with a 
letter which will show him that he has been too 
hasty.” 

“ Good : so much for your father. Now for your 
fiancee. What will sho say of this retreat?” 

“ She well knows that the mightiest armies — and 
ours are very small — are obliged to countermarch 
at times. Ah, my severe cousin, I can imagine all 
there is behind your silence. Hold ! I would like 
to know what you would do in my place?” 

“ You want to know what I would do, if at twenty- 
four I had the happiness to beloved by a beautiful, 
young, devoted woman, capable of sufficient cour- 
age of sharing with me a life that would seem sub 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


107 


lime to her, provided love crowned it? Well, my 
dear Alain, I should go and seek that woman out; 
I should bring her here. How? I know not. But 
I would snatch her from every conventionalism in 
the world, from all refusals, every obstacle. That 
is what / should do, my friend.” 

The viscount opened his great eyes. With a 
mixture of astonishment, admiration, and irony, he 
exclaimed : 

“I thought you quite another man!” 

“Yes,” answered Cleguerac. “You would quit 
‘The Hermitage’ with a certain amount of consid- 
eration for me^ You would say to yourself : He was 
a man! he supports all — cold, heat, fatigue, Rabat’s 
cookery. He does not spend his time in idle 
dreams. You would also say: He is as big a fool 
as the rest of them. Confess it.” 

“With your permission,” said Alain, “and if I 
dared to use your words, I should perhaps say that 
you would appear to me an even bigger fool than 
the rest.” 

“ All right ! But stay, I did not close my eyes 
last night on your account. I was imagining, 
a little too hastily, it seems, having you for a neigh- 
bor, and in a pretty little house not very far away 
your wife. You see nothing in that to prevent an 
honest man from sleeping. Ah, it is because you 
have not lived alone for years upon the prairies, 
alone with two stern comrades, work and will. 
One day, racing after some runaway horses, I met, 
about twenty miles from here, a neighbor who per- 


LOVt: KNOWS NO LAW. 


ioS 

suaded me to sleep at his farm-house. If you had 
only seen his farm! A log-cabin built of rough 
rude trunks of trees. But in that cabin was a win- 
dow; at that window a young woman was seated. 
My host pointed her out to me when nearly half a 
mile off, ‘I am late,’ said he. ^Maggie is at her 
observatory ; I must be ready with my excuses ; for 
she gets uneasy if I do not enter at the proper in- 
stant. ’ 

“We penetrated an interior I need not seek to 
paint. But when that wife clung to her husband’s 
neck as though he had escaped from shipwreck, all 
for half an hour’s detention on his part, I fancied I 
was in a palace. Nevertheless, his poor Maggie 
bore, I imagine, but the faintest possible resem- 
blance to Mademoiselle Montdauphin. When I re- 
entered ‘The Hermitage’ the next day my castle 
seemed to me the dingiest of huts, because no hu- 
man soul awaited me. Am I not ridiculous?” 

“No,” answered Alain, “but in spite of our cal- 
endar ages, it is I who am the oldest.” 

Maurice looked at his watch. He had forgotten 
the hour in his theme, a thing that with him hap- 
pened very seldom. 

“I leave you, then, to pack your baggage,” said 
he to his cousin, “ and will prepare for your depart- 
ure. This time be easy in your mind ; your bag- 
gage shall not pause upon the way.” 

The traveller was once more en route for New 
York. Maurice had regained his solitude, but he 
no longer found the same tranquillity of spirit. At 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


109 

first he felt the unpleasing sensations of the specta- 
tor who, beholding the best role in a fine piece ill- 
played, can hardly help saying aloud: 

How much better I could play it myself.” 

Then, as he thought on the weaknesses in Alain’s 
character, he reproached himself with not having 
sufficiently tried to argue him out of them, with not 
having sufficiently encouraged his guest’s better 
instincts. And, at last, he laughed at himself for 
having taken that nature, incapable of sacrifice or 
strife, so seriously. As for Mademoiselle de Mont- 
dauphin, he only thought of her to pity her, and also 
to admire her, which was admiration on credit, see- 
ing how very little he knew of that interesting 
young person. He was astonished at the viscount’s 
great reserve while speaking of her, not under- 
standing that it sprang from embarrassment. But 
having to judge the unknown through imagination, 
he made her a rare type, not only of beauty but of 
tenderness, fidelity, and courage. Thus, for him, she 
existed — a woman loving enough to abandon the 
pleasures of her family, her country, and civilization, 
to follow her husband to an almost savage desert. 

If he had preserved energy enough to consecrate 
to his duties the usual amount of intelligence and en- 
ergy, it must be admitted that he went through 
them in extreme ill-humor. When he arrived at 
“ The Hermitage, ” he had made a compact with him- 
self that he would be rich within a dozen years or 
perish on the plains. Till then, in the midst of pres- 
ent impossibilities and future uncertainties, it was 


I lO 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


throwing away time to dream of the supreme do- 
mestic joy of hearth and family. In fact, before 
Alain’s arrival, he thought of marriage maybe 
twice a year, and in the same way as the cavalry- 
man, sword in hand upon the field, thinks of the 
pleasures of the bivouac — that is to say, at the actual 
moment impracticable, in the future doubtful. 

Then beholding the advent of this cousin from 
the great world who spoke as of a very natural 
thing of bringing a young and charming wife upon 
the prairie, Cleguerac began to refiect himself, and 
ask if his own reveries had not been far too modest. 
From that hour Robinson Crusoe found his island 
lonely ; he began to sleep uneasily at night. But, 
in defiance of his prototype, his trouble was the 
absence of a footprint on the shore. Nevertheless, 
Friday was destined shortly to appear. 

One day Maurice was at breakfast, waited on by 
Rabat, and less from curiosity than pity put up with 
his verbosity. We must say that the sailor, for the 
same reason as a parrot, talked because he couldn’t 
help himself, and only asked the privilege of a lis- 
tener. And subjects of interest were by no means 
common. The sojourn of young Lavandien and 
his abrupt departure were talked out. Besides, 
that young man, in spite of a handsome present, had 
left a disagreeable impression on Rabat’s mind. 

“I do not allow myself to judge monsieur’s 
friends, but I don’t think M. de Lavandien will 
ever come back here. He had his people to visit ! 
PTom the very moment when I saw him talking to 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. I I l 

the Prussian, my opinion was made up about him. 
Monsieur speaks sometimes to the father, it is true, 
but monsieur is obliged. Monsieur would never 
allow himself to be wheedled by our spies/’ 

For a long time Maurice did not attempt to argue 
this point with Rabat. He had admitted that the 
Baron Oberkorn came to the Great North West 
expressly in order to notify Bismarck as to the 
deeds and movements of two prairie Frenchmen. 

That day, contrary to his custom, the sailor 
dropped one thing that sounded like a question. 

‘‘ Monsieur, have we any remedy in our phar- 
macy for inflammation of the chest?” 

Cleguerac, at this warning of illness in the vicin- 
ity, started from his reverie and asked : 

“ Is it one of our own men who is ill?” 

‘‘ No, monsieur. Thank heaven, I think it is 
only Mademoiselle d’ Oberkorn. Her father was 
here this morning.” 

“The Baron d’ Oberkorn has called on me!” 

“Oh, monsieur, he did not go in,” the sailor 
proudly said, misunderstanding the reason of his 
master’s tone. 

“ And he desired ” 

“With as much as I could make out of his jar- 
gon, I caught these few words, ‘inflammation of 
the chest,’ ‘very ill indeed,’ ‘some remedy, ’ ‘ poor 
child.’ Would you believe it, he wept, monsieur. 
A Prussian weeping!” 

“Have you never wept, Rabat?” said Cleguerac, 
quickly quitting the table. 


I 12 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“Yes, monsieur. When Courbet died. But 
then, he was our admiral!” 

Maurice was already on the wing. A quarter of 
an hour afterward he entered the “Gray House” 
for the first time in his life ; for all his previous in- 
terviews with his neighbor, always on matters of 
business, had taken place at the miniature office of 
the sugar factory or on the way to Wabigoon. 

The German immigrant girl who acted as domes- 
tic help introduced Maurice, without any questions, 
into Irene’s little chamber. Maiden modesty, race 
hatred, all must stand aside before the common 
enemy. The father was seated before a couch of 
dazzling whiteness whose sky-blue ball-trimmed 
hangings lent an air of extravagant luxury to so 
much poverty. Just now the Prussian dared not 
weep. All the while watching his daughter’s 
troubled respiration, he tried to maintain an out- 
ward calm, which hurt Maurice to see more than a 
cataract of sobs. 

At the sound of the door opening, Irene lifted 
her heavy eyelids. She recognized her visitor, ap- 
peared greatly struck with surprise, and then al- 
lowed a gleam of joy to s-weep out from her eyes, 
which she instantly closed again. 

“Heavens! I am very very ill,” she murmured 
in German. 

Cleguerac answered in English, the language he 
always used in conversation with the baron. 

“Mademoiselle, you are not so very very ill 
and we must not allow you to become so. I am 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. II3 

about to place my services at your father’s dis- 
posal. What says the doctor?” 

“We have not seen him yet,” stammered Ober- 
korn. “ Wabigoon is so far away. I have not dared 
to leave my daughter, and we had nobody to take 
so long a journey for us.” 

Clegu^rac, meanwhile, had not removed his eyes 
from Irene’s features. He thought he saw her for 
the first time now, and was thunderstruck to find 
her marvellously beautiful. In fact, she showed just 
then a burning beauty, thanks to the fever that 
painted her face, and one of the strongest emotions 
that ever filled the heart of sweet sixteen. Never 
had a similar flow of liquid gold flooded the em- 
broidered satin pillow of a queen. Her malady had 
swept away every trait that was derogatory to her 
loveliness, or made an odious contrast with it, such 
as her inevitable hat and skirt, those articles that 
showed what they should not and hid what should 
have been revealed. 

No longer could poor Irene ever tell herself 
that she was always passed unnoticed by Mau- 
rice. She had the joy of bping looked at, of feeling, 
knowing herself admired, of appearing, at last, in a 
not unbecoming costume, the only one within their 
humble means — a gown of spotless white set off by 
bows of the color of her eyes. She smiled with 
happiness, so much so that her father imagined her 
already cured. She smiled again for very satisfac- 
tion in having at last solved the hideous mystery ; 
“ Decidedly — it was that skirt I” 

8 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


I 14 

All of a sudden the smile vanished, and the 
cheeks grew three shades paler. 

“ What shall I do when I have to get up once 
more and dress myself? Suppose he passes me by 
unnoticed all over again!” 

Alas 1 a somewhat premature question. A violent 
access of coughing supervened — it was no longer 
a question of smiles or no smiles. Maurice said a 
word in the baron’s ear, who answered, in a broken 
tone: 

“Sir, if I could do it without disquieting my 
daughter, I would throw myself at your knees to 
thank you.” 

Cleguerac disappeared. Irene, in the middle of 
her coughing spell, found strength to murmur in 
her father’s ear: 

“Why did he go away?” 

“ Do not talk. He is gone to Wabigoon to fetch 
Mac Allan.” 

The cough recommenced, but the expression of 
the suffering child almost resembled a smile. She 
pictured Maurice galloping thirty miles — for her — 
without slack or halt. 

Gallop, Annie, brave steed! Over the naked 
plain, nothing to encounter on one’s way save the 
chilly breeze, mother of the snow that was to fol- 
low — against one of those attacks of inflammation 
that often build a tomb in four-and-twenty hours ! 

If only MacAllan is at Wabigoon! MacAllan, 
that grizzled Irishman, doctor, surgeon, accoucheur, 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. II5 

dentist, druggist, tuner of pianos, and — rest aston- 
ished, Moliere — life insurance agent! 

Oh, what luck! it is the doctor himself who opens 
the door to Maurice. 

“ Here you are, doctor. What a piece of good 
fortune.” 

“ Unlucky chance. My tablets tell me of twen- 
ty-seven promised visits. Twenty-seven guineas 
thrown away!” 

‘Wou shall not lose the twenty-eighth, I tell you. 
Quickly come.” 

“ To your house?” 

“Quite close to it; the Baron d’Oberkorn’s. His 
daughter is exceedingly ill with pneumonia.” 

“ Heaven aid her ! As for me, I cannot make my 
visits on foot in a country where the houses are 
contiguous in the same sense as the planets in the 
sky.” 

“Your horse is.lame?” 

“Worse — he is dead.” 

“Take Annie; but race to the baron's.” 

“ I know your horse, sir. If I get a broken shoul- 
der the baron will not set it.” 

“ Well, then, get up behind. On the word of a 
Breton, if you don’t I will carry you, dead or alive, 
across my saddle !” 

“ Listen to me, crazy Frenchman. We will go 
in search of a vehicle. I like Annie better between 
two shafts than under mey 

Th^ turnout organized; “quick and bad,” as the 


Il6 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

doctor called it, half the contents of Mac Allan’s 
pharmacy was put aboard (Maurice wished to take 
it all in order to be on the safe side) and a start was 
made. 

At the end of two minutes, or, if you prefer it, 
of half a mile, the Irishman’s teeth began to chat- 
ter with alarm. 

“You have been drinking,” he cried, “or you 
are madly in love with the poor girl. But if you 
go on in this crazy fashion we shall both come to 
our deaths before she will.” 

When the doctor, closely followed by his guide, 
entered Irene’s room, the baron rubbed his eyes, 
thinking he was dreaming. 

“Less than four hours going and returning to 
Wabigoon!” he cried. 

But quicker even than Annie had the malady 
galloped during those few hours. Half-way be- 
tween reason and delirium, the spirit of the young 
girl floated. While the doctor gave the father the 
necessary instructions, Cleguerac approached the 
bed. With an unexpected swift but gentle move- 
ment Irene took his hand, and holding it hard be- 
tween her burning fingers, softly sighed : 

“Oh! do not leave me now to die.” 

“ My poor child,” said the baron in broken tones, 
beckoning to the physician. “ She recognizes no- 
body any longer. She takes our young neighbor 
for you.” 

The Irishman’s gray eyes had lost no iota of the 
little scene. Already had he opened his mouth to 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. II7 

reply when, on second thought, he made no an- 
swer, approaching the bed in his turn. 

“ Mademoiselle, be kind enough to let me have 
your hand.” 

Maurice left the room. Irene followed his every 
footstep with a gaze from which the glow went out 
when he had disappeared. 

It was not the end of the affair to have brought 
the doctor; he must be taken back. Happily, 
Blackfoot, Alain’s horse, was available. Not too 
much so, not having been mounted for a week. 
He had never been between the shafts in his life. 
But this detail is considered of little importance in 
the Great North West. 

The consultation over, all remedies prepared and 
ordered, Mac Allan took his place in the buggy 
once more beside Clegu6rac. Blackfoot started off 
like an arrow in the direction of the only stable he 
had ever known. Hardly had he reached the summit 
of the “ Gray House” knoll than the animal had the 
bit between his teeth. If Wabigoon had only been 
a few miles nearer, our travellers would have run 
the greatest risk to life and limb by traversing the 
streets with the velocity of rockets. 

But toward the twentieth mile Blackfoot began 
to slacken speed. Never will Lavandien know what 
a magnificent trotter he has lost ! 

The doctor did not open his mouth during the 
transit ; in fact, his teeth were too painfully clinched 
to allow him. As he left the buggy, Maurice asked : 
“ What ails her?” 


Il8 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

“Pneumonia, very likely,” answered MacAllan, 
wiping away the cold perspiration that was stream- 
ing down his face. 

And as his companion continued to look inquir- 
ingly, puzzled by the tone and answer : 

“Do you know what I was just thinking of?” 
went on the Canadian ^sculapius. “ Of an inscrip- 
tion I once read on a rock that juts out at the source 
of the most famous hot spring in Japan.” 

“What said this rock?” 

“ It said — as now old Dr. MacAllan tells you : 

“ ^ I can cure every malady 
SAVE LOVE/” 


IX. 


The next morning Maurice hastened to the 
“ Gray House” for the news. Oberkorn met him 
at the door. 

“The child is better. She is in her senses 
now.” 

“That good Mac Allan ” Cleguerac was be- 

ginning. 

The baron interrupted Maurice, seizing both his 
hands, and spoke with a warmth that showed him 
in an entirely new light. 

“ Monsieur, for the present let us not talk about 
doctors. Irene’s recovery is due to you. You 
have done for her all that you could do for the 
daughter of your dearest friend. What good can 
the gratitude of one worsted, like myself, so wo- 
fully in the battle of life do you? but little good, 
alas! But you are the master of this house, and 
you have conquered me, my dear French gentle- 
man. I honor you, and I would I had it in my 
power to give you all your good and loyal heart de- 
serves.” 

“Amen,” said Maurice gravely, pressing the Ger- 
man’s hand. 

He continued his route toward the sugar-houses, 
whither his ordinary work now called him. 

119 


120 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW, 


“ Monsieur,” continued the father, “forgive a 
poor sick girl’s caprices. Irene made me promise 
solemnly that if you came I would conduct you to 
her. Do her that favor : five minutes will suffice.” 

Cleguerac entered and’ only remained five min- 
utes. They did not want to let him go. He had 
to threaten : 

“ I shall return for Mac Allan. He will forbid 
you seeing any living soul, and he will once more 
put the cupping-glasses on you.” 

“Oh, no, no, no. They hurt so much,” sighed 
the child. “ But you will come to-morrow?” 

“Yes, if you let me go before I tire you out.” 

“You will come again to-morrow, and the next 
day, and the next, and every day, until I am en- 
tirely well?” 

“I promise you. Quick, put back your hand. 
It is cold.” 

“On your word of honor?” 

“On my word of honor.” 

“It is well. You may go now. I am at rest in 
my mind.” 

Maurice kept his word to the letter. After each 
visit, always very short, the baron conducted him 
to the gate with the' usual question : 

“ Really, you think that she is better?” 

One day Oberkorn said to his neighbor: 

“ How well you know how to make the child 
laugh at trifles. It is because you are happy. 
When she is with me it is she, on the contrary, who 
tries to make me smile, but often I forget my role. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


I2I 


How good of you it is to pretend to be interested in 
my poor child’s silly prattle!” 

Poor Irene ! Even her father fancied her still in 
the short- skirted stage. 

Some time afterward the convalescent stage be- 
gan. Cleguerac encountered the baron no more. 
The excellent man was busy with his farm, which 
had not gained, we may suppose, during the crisis. 
The German girl was sewing near her young mis- 
tress. 

“Take a seat on this sofa — our sofa,” said Irene. 
“Take off your muffler.” 

“ I have not lent you my plaid to cover your fur- 
niture.” 

“ Always scolding ! When I see your neck-shawl 
in front of me it seems that something of yourself 
is keeping company with me. Do you think, ever, 
by any chance, that it was you who saved my life?” 

“ Come, come ; a'S if it was possible to die in a 
country where there are no cemeteries.” 

“ Everything must have a beginning. My father 
has built his first house ; I should have been the 
cause of digging the first grave. The very place 
is indicated in my will.” 

“Aha!” said Cleguerac, in a jesting tone, “so 
you have made your will. You are a young lady 
of foresight. At least, may I hope that I am among 
the beneficiaries?” 

Irene’s great eyes fixed themselves on Maurice 
with that pure and loyal intensity of look they 
showed at his lightest question. 


122 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“There is only one difficulty. I have nothing 
worth giving. I am as poor as a beggar.” 

“Can you say that?” retorted Cleguerac. “On 
your head you carry more gold than would suffice 
to gild the ‘Gray House' from foundation to roof.” 

It was the first time Irene had ever listened to a 
personal compliment. Reddening with ingenuous 
joy she asked : 

“ My hair pleases you?” 

“More than pleases, it enchants me. I have 
never seen the like.” 

“ Indeed, ” said she, with a singular smile. “ Then 
behold your legacy.” 

During a minute she was silent, lost in some 
mysterious train of thought. A universal shudder 
shook her. Maurice took his plaid and wrapped 
her shoulders in it. She nestled back, immobile, 
in a sort of ecstasy. Then she said, with half- 
closed eyes : 

“ How good you are. But I was not cold.” 

“You are cold, on the contrary. I saw you trem- 
ble.” 

Irene shook her head, without describing the 
vision that had made her shudder. Cleguerac con- 
tinued : 

“You are imprudent beyond description. Now 
you see what you gain by remaining hours in the 
cold breeze improperly sheltered. Between our- 
selves, I hardly understand what makes you so in- 
fatuated with your veranda.” 

“ From there I can behold the passers-by.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


123 


“ The passers-by !” cried Maurice, laughing heart- 
ily. “ Poor little Sister Anne. Beyond myself, 
who pass two or three times a day — If, at least, 
you were a little more warmly clothed.” 

A sudden blush empurpled Irene’s face to the 
very eyes. 

She remembered a certain allusion, differently 
meant, made by Alain, to her short dress. Now 
she remained ill at ease till the conclusion of the 
visit, and, when Maurice went, she obtained a 
promise that he would bring back with him the 
next time he went to Wabigoon, Minnie, the pas- 
tor’s wise, kind, copper-headed daughter Minnie, 
confidante of all the better young ladies of the dis- 
trict, their looking-glass of decorum and behavior. 

A few days afterward, Minnie descended from 
Cleguerac’s buggy in front of the “Gray House.” 
What those two friends had to talk about for eight- 
and-forty hours nobody will ever know. When the 
city young lady regained the wood chalet decorated 
with the pompous title of “ The Vicarage,” she took 
with her an armory of notes, calculations, and one 
package imperceptibly damp with tears, from which 
crept, when all was still, like a last adieu, the sad 
little tick-tack of Irene’s mother’s poor little gold 
watch. 

A fortnight went by. Faithful to his word, ev- 
ery afternoon Maurice spent a few minutes with 
Irene, going to his business. He began to fancy 
she had grown too prudent, that she hesitated more 
and more each time to make the first advance across 


124 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


the room. Nevertheless the thought that he would 
soon pass in front of that house daily without be- 
ing under any obligation to enter, proved by no 
means pleasant. Their daily conversation, often 
very short, for the most part of the time kept alive 
by almost childish jests and allusions, stirred a 
sweetness in his life that he had not known since 
he came to “ The Hermitage,'’ an appetite for which 
he now began to feel with some insistance. 

But one fine day he was gloriously surprised to 
behold, in her fauteuil, in Irene’s chamber, the 
prettiest woman he had seen since quitting France. 
The convalescent, for it was she, rose and came to 
meet him with outstretched hand. She was dressed 
in a new robe, which a Parisian might possibly 
have found a little behind the fashions, but which 
had the greatest advantage a robe can possess : that 
of not obscuring the personal advantages of its 
wearer. The only fault with which one could re- 
proach it, at first glance, was that of being a little 
too long in the skirt. Irene von Oberkorn was 
evidently anxious to make up for lost time. 

Maurice had the good taste — and heart — to ac- 
centuate and prolong his expression of admiration 
and surprise. Did he understand that, even at that 
moment, thanks to him, the young girl snatched 
from death was tasting the purest, greatest joy that 
she had ever known ? At least she saw herself re- 
garded, appreciated, judged, as though she were 
somebody. No longer was she the disdained child, 
the spoilt invalid. Just as she would have done in 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


125 


one of Worth’s salons, she marched to the right 
and to the left, partly because she hardly knew yet 
how to set those multitudinous folds that seemed to 
caress her feet so deliciously. She smiled at her 
reflection in front of the uneven old chimney mir- 
ror. She criticised her coiffure, rather well than 
ill arranged, after a lesson given her by Minnie. 
But such was the golden wealth of the rough ma- 
terial that the eye dwelt less on form than color. 
Tired of admiring herself and being admired in 
silence, she went up to Maurice and, standing right 
in front of him, exclaimed abruptly : 

“Then I have pleased you?” 

“Greatly,” answered he, unable to find a longer 
phrase. 

“‘Greatly’ only; not very, very much?” 

He dropped his eyes before this very ignorance 
of purity, which sported with coquetry as with some 
unknown arm, picked up by chance. 

“Yes, ‘very, very much,’ then,” he admitted. 

“ You are not of the same opinion in regard to 
me you used to be?” 

“ I had no opinion.” 

“Oh, as to that, you say truly. You considered 
me an infant. And, no doubt, you are not very 
fond of children?” 

“ From whom, may I ask, did you so succinctly 
gather what was on my mind?” 

“ From your friend the Parisian. Who save him ? 
But you have not answered me. Have I still the 
appearance of a child?” 


126 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Cleguerac fixed his eyes for an instant on the 
young girl, and in that look which she obtained 
in "answer to her secret wish, something magnetic, 
hitherto unknown, vibrated. 

“No, mademoiselle,” said Maurice, bowing, “you 
have no longer the appearance of a child.” 

They sat down and would have talked — but on 
what subject? 

The visitor beat about for phrases, and involun- 
tarily cast his eyes over his rough prairie costume. 
Irene saw and understood the look. 

“ One would say, now, that I was putting you in 
awe.” 

“ No ; only I cannot get out of my head that I 
came to be presented to your dear sister. And I 
do not easily forget old friends.” 

As he rose to go : 

“Well,” said Irene, “senior or junior, both sis- 
ters love you equally well ; and they bid you good- 
by, with good luck until to-morrow.” 

“ But you are well now, mademoiselle,” said Mau- 
rice, turning his straw hat in his hands restlessly. 

Irene contracted her eyebrows, as though to com- 
bat an anticipated objection. 

“ Listen carefully to me. If you do not stop to- 
morrow, as you have done every day for a month, 
lift your head as you go by again in the evening. 
On the honor of an Oberkorn, I swear to you Sister 
Anne will be looking from her tower. So much 
the worse for you if you are forced to go again in 
search of Dr. MacAllan.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


127 


One could read in Irene’s eyes, blazing with, ex- 
altation, that she would carry out her foolish threat. 
Cleguerac quickly promised to stop, and as she 
reached out her hand, without thinking he lifted it 
to his lips, which Irene von Oberkorn seemed to 
think a very natural thing. Only the immigrant 
girl allowed her sewing to drop on her knees, 
opening her large eyes, as though she was looking 
at unknown people. 

The evening of that day, one of long twilights of 
autumn, was, without exception, the pleasantest 
that Maurice had ever passed beneath his solitary 
roof. And yet he had known many happy hours 
there, the quiet hours that followed every new prog- 
ress in his various enterprises, pledges of ultimate 
success. But at last he had the certainty, contrary 
to every hope, that his was now the happiness, long 
dreamed, of being followed by every thought of a 
sweet and gracious creature, the consciousness of a 
loving shadow with him in his every step. He was 
no longer alone! A few hundred yards away lived 
a sweet child, woman in virtue of a consciousness 
that she as yet ignored, whose happiness or misery 
were inseparably connected with her neighbor’s 
lightest acts. No longer did he envy the happily- 
mated young farmer he had visited in his prairie 
home. He, too, when the clock should sound a 
certain hour, would be able to say to himself : She 
is awaiting me !” 

Perhaps we may accuse this man of egotism, who 
thus tasted the sweetness of being loved without 


r28 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


entirely loving in return. But we may reply, first- 
ly, that if he was grateful for the good received, 
Irene, making the gift, was even more so. In the 
second place, if Cleguerac was hardly of those, or 
no longer of those who fall in love at first sight, he 
belonged, to all appearance, to those on whom a 
love like that of Irene’s is sure to make a deep and 
satisfactory impression. But above all, let us seek 
to imagine what he suffered, for years, in the chill 
surroundings of his life! Never had he com- 
plained, even to himself, that his life was too rough, 
his work too overwhelming. But very rarely had 
he gone to sleep without asking himself what would 
happen, some day, if some grave sickness pre- 
vented him from rising. And if death itself 
should knell for him in his full youth, the mighty 
voyage — what a taking-leave ! 

One must have known, in order to appreciate its 
power, the instinctive want that every human be- 
ing feels of being mourned for in the hour su- 
preme. Necessities, confronted by this luxury of 
the heart, appear superfluous. 

Such, in the hours following Irene’s unexpected 
revelation, had been the thoughts of Maurice de 
C16guerac. 

The next day, all through the morning, he had 
the unknown pleasure of saying to himself : 

“ I will tell her what I have been doing. I will 
consult her on such and such an undertaking.” 

For he felt drawn to this pure young soul by the 
bonds of a measureless confidence, so young, yet 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


129 


already so judicious and so just! In seeing her 
again lie experienced a satisfaction greater even 
than he anticipated. The immigrant had dis- 
appeared; Irene was sewing near the fire. She 
interrupted her work in order to hold out her 
hand. 

“ Your fauteuil awaits you,” she smiled, “ and will 
await you always.” 

The “always” from that mouth appeared a sim- 
ple setting of the truth. Who, then, except Mau- 
rice, would conceive the idea of taking the place in 
question? And what other fauteuil, save this one, 
could ever be designed for him by another lady- 
neighbor ? Both these beings felt an instinct that 
it was the will of fate they should be friends, as 
Cleguerac self -explained it, sitting down. 

“Yes,” answered the girl, “and yet it was fated 
that the angel of the grave himself had to fetch 
you, in order that you should now be seated where 
you are. How many a year, after that, would you 
have passed me by with a sweeping courtesy, and 
without a look? Oh, those bows!” 

“ Can I doubt that you honor me with your curi- 
osity, my bows with — indignation?” 

“You can, it seems to me, after one has told you 
so expressly in so many words.” 

“ I have been told, on your part, personally,” said 
Cleguerac, laughing. 

“Oh!” answered Irene, very seriously. “You 
have been told, and you have saluted the prettiest 
as you would have saluted the most evil spirit.” 

9 


130 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“Was it by any chance my friend Lavandien 
who charged himself with such an embassy?'’ 

“ Can you tell me he never asked you to accom- 
pany him here?” 

“Alain!” cried Maurice, laughing loudly. “You 
had an excellent messenger. He simply never told 
me he had even been to see you.” 

Irene became purple, but this time the blush 
was one of righteous anger. 

“ I did not think I was one of those with whom it 
is necessary to hide one’s acquaintance,” said she, 
drawing herself up. “ The grandest gentlemen in 
Germany at one time thought it an honor to be re- 
ceived by my mother and to kiss her hand.” 

“ There, there, child, calm yourself. I would not 
allow any of my friends to show the faintest disre- 
spect for Baron d’Oberkorn’s daughter. Only ” 

He broke off abruptly, asking himself if it were 
generous to trouble such happy ignorance by call- 
ing up the hideous phantom ever in activity six 
thousand miles away. 

Irene, tapping her foot, insisted. 

“ I want to know your thought,” said she. 

“You shall know it. In order to that end, I must 
ask you a question. Did you ever get to under- 
stand the meaning of the great word War?” 

“ Undoubtedly. I have learned history. War is 
a duel between two nations.” 

“Yes, but a duel of a peculiar kind, where the 
conqueror sleeps on the bed of the wounded, which 
renders reconciliation rather difficult. Did they 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


13I 

tell you the name of the opponents in the grand 
duel that made Europe tremble, now twenty years 
ago?” 

“ It was so long ago,” cried Irene von Oberkorn 
gayly. “ I was not born.” 

“ Alain de Lavandien was born ; and, besides, 
with us, who forget many things so quickly, even 
the young men who were not born remember that'' 

Irene grew pale. One would have said that a 
gust of glacial air had fallen on her shoulders, to 
see the light shiver that stirred her. 

“ Which of your relations remained among the 
dead ?” asked Irene, involuntarily lowering her 
voice. 

“ None ; at least near ones,” answered Cleguerac. 

She sighed contentedly. 

Ah ! you frighten me. How you looked !” 

“ Why should I not curse a war that has wrought 
such infinite evil?” 

“ You say has wrought you so much evil? What 
would you say in my place? Do you know what 
that war was to me and mine?” 

A profound sadness chased smiles and youth 
from that sixteen-year-old face. Maurice was deep- 
ly touched, and felt very angry with himself for 
having touched the dreadful subject. 

“ Let those sleep who sleep, and suffer who suf- 
fer. As you said just now, it is so long ago.” 

“ Alas ! for you it is yet too near at hand. In a 
second I have understood it all. If I should lose 
your friendship ! You will see we have only to pity 


132 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


each other, only to pity each other. My father had 
been married two months when he went away ” 

“Ah!” cried Cleguerac, passing his hand over 
his forehead. “He fought against us, then?” 

“ Did you think to hear that an Oberkorn had de- 
serted in the face of the enemy — you who have worn 
a sword yourself? He went, as was his duty, leav- 
ing between life and death the one who lived but 
for him, my poor beloved mother. He fought, did 
I say? But not for long. The evening of the first 
engagement his name was among the dead in the 
dispatches. My mother went to the front. She 
found her husband, still breathing, in a hospital. 
At the end of a month they were able to bring him 
home. But all the winter he remained an invalid. 
I came into the world the day the peace was signed. 
Thence my name — do you know what it signifies?” 

“Yes,” answered Cleguerac, whose visage was 
clear again. “I know Irene means peace. Your 
name is as sweet as your eyes.” 

Already, she felt, her cause was gained. With 
a lighter heart she went on : 

“ So small and weak was I, it was a mighty task 
for me to live. As for my mother, she never knew 
from that day what health meant. This is what 
that war has done for us, of which you speak, clinch- 
ing your fists and rolling your eyes to heaven. But 
I have never heard my parents curse it. Why this 
difference ? Must one think your countrymen do not 
know how to resign themselves to inevitable evil?” 

“Child,” sighed C16gu6rac, “certain evils cannot 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 1 33 

be forgotten because they renew themselves every 
day.” 

“Your words seem meant for us, for the peace 
cost us more dearly than the war. My parents, in 
fair circumstances, lived in their own house, where 
I was born. They sold it to settle in Berlin, where 
my father obtained a position which kept us till I 
was twelve years old in affluence and comfort. 
Then we were branded with the most unjust of dis- 
graces. All went to ruin ; there was nothing left. 
Our ancient protectors impelled us to come here to 
seek better fortune. Had they acted in good faith? 
Were they now desirous of getting rid of us? I 
know not, neither do I know with what crime we 
were charged. I only know that on the eve of de- 
parture my mother fell sick. She died. I can al- 
ways see my father near the bed, pale as the dead 
it supported, clasping my mother’s cold hands, but 
shedding never a tear. Often I hear him say in a 
voice that has forever broken something in my 
heart: ‘How well you have done, my darling, to go 
where you have gone, instead of going where we 
are going.’ ” 

Fraulein von Oberkorn was silent. Cl^guerac, 
liming his head, wiped away a tear. All at once 
his hand was seized, and two lips touched the spot 
where it was wet. A voice murmured so softly as to 
be scarcely audible : “ Ah, you are my brother now !” 


X. 


During llie night Clegu^rac slept but little. He 
employed his morning, according to custom, in 
overlooking his various industrial and agricultural 
operations. Then he came in for breakfast, a re- 
past he went through in profound silence. 

Rabat, his white cap well pulled down over his 
head, resembled a mother-in-law that covets a scene 
with her son-in-law, but dare not begin. Neither 
his voice nor his steps were audible, nor was the 
slightest sound of clicking crockery heard — phe- 
nomena which showed the old mariner either to be 
in a discontented frame of mind, or to be desirous of 
bringing about what he called a simplification in his 
work. This literal dumb waiting at any ordinary 
time would have aggravated his master to the last 
degree. Happily he knew Rabat’s family skeleton ; 
that is to say, the existence of Zetie and accesso- 
ries, by which means he could at any time cut short 
these affectations. Without this weapon in the 
master’s hand the functions of the servant would 
have ere this ended by simplifying themselves down 
to zero. 

But that day all such domestic thunder-clouds 
passed unperceived. Cleguerac ate “with the 
ends of his teeth.’* One would have said that he 


134 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


135 


was falling in love. By no means. He was simply 
growing thoughtful and somewhat troubled with 
the conversation of the night before, because it 
ended with the resolution, tacitly arrived at be- 
tween the interlocutors, of avoiding in future a 
painful subject touched on for the first time between 
them. 

On the previous evening, too, Fraulein von 
Oberkorn’s thoughts had something in them very 
sweet to him, as of a flower that has suddenly 
bloomed with tropic perfume in the desert. To 
pluck that flower was not now the question. But it 
grew exceedingly near his reach. He could now, 
without a shadow or a doubt, rejoice to see that 
flower every day. He said to himself : “ In spite 
of her long robe, she is still a child. To think of 
her otherwise would be madness. But some day, 
if my ’ courage for solitary labor should suddenly 
abandon me, and I were to ask this child to be my 

wife Could I commit an act of madness more 

pleasing and more prudent?” 

Alas ! since the hazard of conversation had sud- 
denly revived in his mind certain memories all was 
changed. The very name Irene struck his ears, at 
that hour, with a significance opposed to the mis- 
sion of peace its meaning should suggest. His 
nerves were unhinged, crowned with thorns of 
roses, until his pleasing reverie became a painful 
problem. 

“ Would it not, indeed, be anything but a mad- 
ness?” he asked himself. 


136 LOV£ iCNOWS NO LAW. 

Vainly he scolded himself for losing his time 
and spoiling his repose in subtleties that led to 
nothing, since he was not in love. 

“You do not love,” his thought responded, “but 
if you should grow to love!” 

Fatigued with this internal revolt, Cleguerac had 
recourse to his will-power to subdue it. A power- 
ful, indeed indomitable, will like his has grown to 
be such a rarity to-day that the psychologists no 
longer take much account of element of the soul, 
while they devote their attention to the workings 
of passion and inclination. One would say it is a 
piece that has been swept off the human chess- 
board. Such was not the case with Maurice, and 
we must have a little patience in order to behold 
him play his part a little differently from the ordi- 
nary run of men. 

On reflection, he decided not only that he would 
pay a visit to Irene, but also that they should con- 
tinue to be good, solid, sincere friends, without 
after-thought of sex or nation. None but honest, 
loyal, generous traits had ever been revealed by 
Maurice Cleguerac. Must he, in this lonely desert, 
renounce the unexpected joys of friendship, be- 
cause certain memories of the past, certain forecasts 
into the future, might possibly disturb the calm? 
What he had to do was to put a seal on trouble- 
some and useless inner voices. He knew he was 
strong enough to do this. As he had told his 
cousin, a few years of prairie life considerably 
thicken the mental epidermis of a man. 


love knows no law. 


13; 


As for Irene, her night had not been much 
easier, but for another reason. She had not put 
herself to ask whether she loved or did not love 
Maurice, any more than she had asked herself 
what dress she should don on the morrow. The 
sweet girl had no choice. She asked herself two 
grand questions— “ Will he come to-morrow?” and 
“What will be upon his mind?” 

In this pessimistic frame of mind, which always 
produces insomnia joined to fixed ideas, she had 
recalled, reworded, plumbed the least details of last 
night’s conversation. 

“ He wept when I told him of my mother’s 
death,” she told herself. “But in what a dreadful 
tone he asked me: ‘Do you know what War is?’ 
And how he started when he learned that papa had 
fought against the French. And then how natural 
he seemed to think it that his friend had concealed 
his visits to me. As he left me, kindness was his 
only instinct. But, his cooler judgment back, what 
will he think ? Perhaps he ought not to come back 
here any more.” 

Such was the intensity of her reverie that she had 
no anxiety for her father’s absence, detained, most 
probably, in Wabigoon by something unexpected. 
Alone in the cottage with a girl scarcely older than 
herself, Irene trembled not at the idea of Indians 
or intrusive cowboys, but at the thought that, per- 
haps, Maurice would not come again. 

Thus, when she beheld him enter a few hours 
later, the poor Irene was on the point of burst- 


138 ^ LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

ing into tears. But she restrained herself, fore- 
warned by an instinct that at any and every price 
this visit must not be allowed to pass like the pre- 
ceding. She knew how to interest Maurice, to 
amuse, and even make him laugh ; and this young 
girl, pure as the lily yet reposing in its calyx, in 
order to do away with certain memories, utilized 
the same profound art that a guilty wife makes use 
of to close a too clairvoyant husband’s eyes. Her 
first care was to abjure the French tongue under 
some pretext, which she knew she spoke with an 
atrocious accent. From that moment English be- 
came their diplomatic language. She mentioned 
her father’s detention, and Maurice, who loved every 
form of courage, was glad to see Irene so brave. 

“ In spite of all that, had I but known you were 
alone, I should have ridden round beneath your 
ramparts.” 

‘‘Good. I am a Canadian woman,” said she, 
dwelling on the word, “a true Canadian. I do not 
need tb be guarded like a girl in a nursery.” 

Questioned on the laborious life she was about to 
resume with restored health, she painted her rude 
duties very simply. 

Clegu6rac spoke in pity. 

“No, no,” she said. “The Great North West is 
not Europe. The ideas, sentiments, prejudices of 
our country evaporate here like the odor of a 
scented sachet in full sunshine. Here, no man suf- 
fers for saddling his horse himself. At Paris such 
a thing would be impossible. But what is impossi- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. I39 

ble in Paris becomes quite natural upon the prai- 
ries.” 

A little after that Maurice took his leave, very 
well satisfied with the half-hour he had passed, and 
Irene somewhat reassured. Cleguerac slept very 
well that night, after thinking, by his lonely fire- 
side, that the friendship of one sex with the other 
is not so uncommon as people say, without men- 
tioning the fact that it is friendship’s sweetest 
form. 

Irene slept peacefully, after conversing with 
her father, home at length, till nearly midnight. 
But, this time, it was the Baron von Oberkorn who 
kept vigil for the rest of the world. An interview 
that he had had in Wabigoon swept away all 
thoughts of sleep. 

The next day, at early morning, the first flakes 
of snow, heralds of the precocious winter of these 
latitudes, covered the grass with a glittering carpet 
that only lasted till the sun was up. 

In preceding years this preliminary warning al- 
ways caused Maurice a strange sensation, which he 
himself compared, in his letters, to the impression 
of the first cold of autumn on the swallow. It was 
one of the days when will should have spoken 
aloud: “You shall remain,” to the Parisian who, 
waking within himself, felt the desire to leave the 
country. When he threw his eyes over the valley 
of Moose Brook, all white with powdery snow, he 
closed them again involuntarily, to see his well- 
beloved France in winter. He shivered with a new 


140 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


sort of fear in his lonely chamber, where, very soon, 
a temperature of forty degrees below zero would 
detain him prisoner for a hundred nights, with the 
sole company of fire, lamp, and — Rabat. The Pa- 
risian world, which he mistrusted at other mo- 
ments, appeared to him now like a sky peopled 
with the elect. He imagined salons one flood of 
brilliant light, inundated with perfume, peopled 
with lovely witty women ; the conversations, light 
or sentimental, held round buffets of choicest meats 
and sweets and liquors; of the theatre, with the 
curtain going up on a new chef- d' oeuvre to the strains 
of liveliest music. For at this distance and in 
such an exile, all he had left behind him in his own 
country seemed exquisite, desirable, and faultless. 

What a difference between the winters of other 
days and that which was about to put in an appear- 
ance. Already he foresaw frequent evenings at the 
“Gray House,” evenings of reading, intimate talk, 
of serious study, perhaps of music. For there were 
pianos at Wabigoon. The baron was a little rough, 
’twas true, but his heart was easily reached. Prob- 
ably concentrated chagrin made up more than two- 
thirds of his darker humors. To amuse him would 
be a charity which Irene and Maurice would under- 
take together. 

All of a sudden Rabat made an irruption into his 
master’s study in a state of most unusual excite- 
ment. 

“Monsieur,” cried the old sailor, “it is he — the 
Prussian!” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


I4I 

Feverishly he awaited Clegu^rac’s answer. A 
few months earlier he might have given that an- 
swer himself in the shape that “ monsieur had gone 
out.” But during the last few weeks he had assisted 
at so many unexpected changes that he no longer 
dared to take upon himself to close the door upon 
the enemy. 

Instead of answering, Maurice bounded out of 
the house crying: “She must be taken sick again!” 

The baron, left provisionally outside, was walk- 
ing up and down the frosty grass. Though a rough 
grizzled beard half covered his face, yet above shone 
a pair of melancholy, strange, soft blue eyes — 
Irene’s eyes — an unexpected contrast that ren- 
dered the face of the baron sympathetic before all 
things. His costume in nothing gave the lie to his 
circumstances. Yet it was easy to see that he had 
been unusually careful ere presenting himself be- 
fore his neighbor. In all his person shone an 
air of ceremony. At first sight, Maurice under- 
stood that he had not now before him a father 
crazed with anxiety, seeking succor for an ailing 
daughter. 

The neighbors saluted with a politeness rather 
anxious on the Frenchman’s part, on that of the 
other, ceremonious and unusual. 

“ Monsieur,” said the Baron von Oberkorn, hat in 
hand, “ can you accord me the honor of a few min- 
utes’ interview?” 

These solemnities increased Maurice’s perplex- 
ity, who did not find his visitor so easy to handle. 


142 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


He designated the way in with a wave of his hand, 
standing aside to leave the entrance free. 

“Be kind enough to take the trouble to go in.” 
An oath from the considerable collection of the 
ancient mariner was deadened by the kitchen win- 
dows. “The Prussian,” for the first time in his 
life, had penetrated “ The Hermitage” ! vSuddenly 
the old sea-wolf slapped his forehead, ran to one of 
the drawers of what he called his steward’s room, 
and with a shaking hand took out his national flag, 
which had not floated in the prairie breeze since 
the arrival of the Viscount de Lavandien. A few 
seconds afterward “ the colors” were flying from the 
roof masthead, not, this time, as a signal of rejoic- 
ing, but as a witness of protestation and defiance. 

Rabat could do no more. He drew back a dozen 
paces in order to see that the bunting floated freely, 
gravely removed his calico cap, and entered his 
kitchen singing at the top of his voice the old re- 
frain that makes fun of the austere figure of “ the 
admiral.” 

“ ‘ Hoist, hoist the flag to the halliard-top, 

To wave all else above : 

And there forever shall it stop. 

The brave French flag we love. ’ ” 

During this time, in Cleguerac’s parlor, the inter- 
view asked by the baron was beginning. 

“ Monsieur,” said he, “as long as I live and what- 
ever may happen, it will appear impossible for me 
to see in you anything else but a friend. Without 
your aid I should have been overwhelmed with the 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


H3 

only disaster, the only real disaster, that fate can 
yet have in reserve for me. You will understand 
this easily, because my daughter has given you an 
outline of my life.” 

Maurice opened his mouth to say what respect 
such purity and misfortune inspired him with. 
His visitor interrupted him with a wave of the 
hand, and continued : 

“ I do not blame Irene for confiding in you. 
How could she have done otherwise, poor isolated 
girl? It is enough to see you to know the kind of 
man you are. And then the child has never seen 
any other man save yourself ; I mean a man capa- 
ble of engaging her fancy. Add to that that her 
heart, the most loyal and loving that ever beat in 
a woman’s breast, retains an enthusiastic gratitude 
toward you.” 

“ I have done my best to prevent that feeling 
becoming exaggerated,” answered Cleguerac. 

“ I know, down to the last syllable, all that you 
have said to my daughter ; but I equally well know 
each of her thoughts. Since she could speak, par- 
ticularly since we have been all the world to each 
other, she has always made me read her heart like 
an open book. For the second time I am come to 
you to ask you to send succor to my child. But to- 
day it is against yourself I invoke that aid.” 

Maurice passed his hand over his forehead and 
reflected for a few moments. 

“Whatever you ask me to do,” he said, “I will 
do it.” 


144 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ Oh, I do not doubt that ! I have beheld yon at 
the worst. One thing only is wanting ; the knowl- 
edge of what I ought to ask of you.” 

The baron smiled, while at the same time an in- 
finite sorrow shone from his deep eyes. The two 
men sat silent for a long minute without looking 
each other. 

‘‘You will tell yourself it is a strange thing for 
me to approach you in such a way. Had we been 
in Europe, I would have spared you this annoyance. 
One finds a relation, a respectable friend, a priest, to 
accomplish similar missions. But were we in Eu- 
rope, the child would know a mass of things she 
does not know. Conversation, reading, what she 
would observe with her own eyes, all would ap- 
prise her that the life of the heart, even more 
than life itself, is full of obstacles. Poor child! 
she judges the future to be like the prairie that 
surrounds her, where the eye itself can find no ob- 
stacle or limitation. Last night she said to me: 
‘If you only knew how happy I am to have, at last, 
a friend.’ But as for me, monsieur, I perceive 
what this friendship will turn into, how this happi- 
ness will end.” 

“You would judge me better if you knew my 
life, even as partially as I know yours,” said Mau- 
rice. 

“Who speaks of judging you? Do you think I 
feel the shadow of a fear at the knowledge that you 
and my daughter are alone? You have no love for 
her, you never will, you say. So be it. It is mar- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


145 


tyrdom, pure and simple, I am preparing for this 
heart of sixteen, without chance of alleviation — a 
desert martyrdom. But if you should deceive your- 
self? If, some day, you should think of her as, 
even now, she thinks of you? My daughter has no 
money — and she is a German.” 

“ Alas !” sighed Cleguerac. 

“You say alas. Then you are not so sure of 
never loving her, or you foresee that love, with 
you, never will be able to forget the rest?” 

The young colonist did not know how to answer. 
This cold logic of beyond the Rhine, set up in face 
of his will, mutely irritated him, a man accustomed 
to overcome all, even his personal feelings, by dint 
of force of will. As though the baron had guessed 
the uneasiness produced by his words, he went on, 
placing himself at another point of view. 

“ Do not think I accuse you of exaggerating cer- 
tain sentiments. Neither you nor I have created 
the reciprocal situation ; to analyze it, judge it, will 
not serve our purpose. It exists. So much so 
that if you were this night to ask me for my daugh- 
ter, you would place me in a position of the cruel- 
lest embarrassment. For I could not hope that you 
would pass the remainder of your lives in the des- 
ert. But what kind of reception, in your family, 
your country, should you return, would be vouch- 
safed to Irene de Cleguerac, nee D’Oberkorn?” 

“Monsieur,” said Maurice, “do not be surprised 
if I am short of words. The subject is a difficult 
one and I — well— 

IQ 


146 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ Am I to understand that you are surprised in 
this extreme frankness on a father’s part? You 
would be wrong, I say. What are we, save two 
shipwrecked men, struggling on an uninhabited 
coast for our life and health and the life and health 
of a woman? In such cases men of heart have but 
one mutual thought: First save the woman. Come; 
the same duty unites us. For the moment the rest 
of the world, with its formulas and conventions, 
for us does not exist. Thanks to heaven our 
minds are worthy of each other.” 

'‘Yes, certainly,” put in Maurice. “Say one 
word and I will nevermore darken your doors.” 

“And afterward,” said the baron, shaking his 
head. “ Is it to be my task to prevent the girl 
from sitting down in the killing north wind, over- 
looking the road along which passes — that which 
she calls Friendship f 

Silence reigned anew. The two men watched the 
blue dancing flames that leaped and purred about 
the burning logs. Suddenly Maurice rose and 
flercely paced the room, then as suddenly stopped 
before the baron. 

“ Push frankness to the bitter end. Do you want 
me to go away for a time, for the winter, let us say? 
But have I the right to do so ? In the mean time 
who would look over all these interests in which 
others have a share?” 

“Who? I. If you would give^ me your confi- 
dence,” said the baron, with a brightening counte- 
nance. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


147 


Cleguerac interrupted his renewed walk and went 
and laid his forehead on the frosty window-panes. 
This word of departure he had let slip, hardly 
knowing how or why, now echoed disagreeably in 
his ears. Why had he spoken it? In one instant 
he passed in mental review the many seductions of 
his country, so eloquent to him in former years. 
Just now the world and its pleasures, jolly dinners, 
the theatres, music, nothing seemed to him worth 
the effort of separation from his home. In truth, 
this voyage to France, impossible under other con- 
ditions, would become advantageous from the mo- 
ment a safe man promised to oversee the farm. 
Maurice had accounts to settle with those who had 
helped him with capital. The regularity of his 
business correspondence had been irreproachable, 
but many times he had been made to feel that 
verbal explanations would have been preferable. 
Vain efforts to convince himself! In spite of all 
the idea that he was about to leave “ The Hermi- 
tage ” affected him in the most disagreeable way ; 
henceforward, for him, it would be no longer exile 
on the prairie 

Some one touched him on the shoulder. He 
turned and felt his visitor’s eyes fixed on him. 

“You hesitate now to go,” said the baron. “Is 
that not a sign that it is best, even for you, to leave 
us?” 

“ Do not speak of me,” answered the young man. 
“ What will you gain by my departure? Some day 
or other I must come back again.” 


148 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

Assuredly, you will come back. But, during 
these long weeks of tete-a-tite in the snowy desert, 
I shall have my daughter’s heart and soul in the 
hollow of my hand. I will gently tell her many, 
many things she is ignorant of relating to herself, 
life, and the painful past. It is a duty I owe her ; 
it would be next to impossible if you were all the 
time at hand. You may go away with an easy 
mind ; your greater labors of the year are past, the 
refinery is closed for the cold season. And I shall 
be here to overlook all, I, your devoted, grateful 
servant all your life. You will go, will you 
not?” 

“I will leave in a few days,” said Cleguerac. 
'‘Till then, what must I do?” 

" The same as you have done the last few days. 
Come to see us. Yourself announce to the child 
that it is imperatively necessary you should go to 
France. Poor child ! It is long since she has had 
to face the dread meaning of that word must. Do 
not tell her you have seen me. If she were to 

guess at anything and desire me to In fine, 

as she calls you her brottier, manage her as you 
would wish that your sister, in her place, were man- 
aged.” 

The interview concluded with these words. 
Cleguerac reconducted his visitor to the outer steps. 
As they were about to separate, the baron heard 
the rustling of the flag overhead now frozen in the 
breeze. He lifted his head, then bent it slightly, 
and said, with a significant gesture ; 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


149 

“ I already knew that I was in the house of a 
good Frenchman.” 

Rabat, in ambuscade behind his kitchen window, 
felt a proud stir through every vein at this courteous 
homage to the flag. From that day he got into the 
habit of lifting his cap whenever he encountered 
the baron, who saluted him, as the old sailor said, 
“stroke for stroke.” 

The same day, seeing her neighbor enter, Irene 
said to him: 

“ What has happened ? You have a look of dis- 
tress. Your face is altogether altered.” 

Cleguerac seized the first argument he got hold 
of, spoke of his difficulties with agents, of insuffi- 
cient capital, and of a probable approaching trip to 
France. 

Long and painfully did Irene’s bosom heave ; she 
closed her eyes, made an effort to hold herself up- 
right, and asked this single question, holding Mau- 
rice with the light of her eyes : 

“You will come back?” 

He answered, attempting a smile: 

“ I can hardly be dispensed with, unless you take 
the direction of my refinery and ranch.” 

“ Heavens ! how wrong people are to try and ar- 
range the future,” she said, without noticing the 
jest. “ I had counted on a winter different, quite, 
from all preceding ones. . . . What has happened 
since yesterday?” 

“ A letter ” stammered Maurice, fumbling in 

his pocket so as not to have to meet Irene’s eyes. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


150 

He lied ill, being unaccustomed, but he lied just 
well enough to deceive a candor ignorant of ev- 
ery kind of lie. Without seeing her visitor’s dis- 
simulative pantomime, she asked : 

“ Your departure is, then, quite decided on ? You 
spoke of it as only probable.” 

“Reason bids me go,” answered Cldguerac. 
“But we shall see each other again — many times.” 

“Ah!” cried she, “I think I could better bear to 
see you go to-day. I have experience of last days 
and hours passed with people and in places that I 
loved.” 

She had endeavored to resume her sewing, but 
two great big tears, rolling down her cheeks, fell 
slowly on her new dress. Poor dress ! What good 
to her henceforward? Nevertheless Irene, without 
affectation wiping away the shining spots, had no 
regret for her little gold watch. Those days of 
happiness that had just passed, she would try and 
resuscitate before the fatal hour of departure. 

“ If you weep I shall never be able to go.” 

Irene lifted her eyes at these words, and saw 
Maurice’s figure bent in distress at the agony whose 
cause and remedy alike he knew so well ! A ray 
of purest joy illumined her lovely countenance, like 
an apparition of sunshine at night. If men only 
knew the power at certain moments of certain words 
to calm, console, and fortify a woman ! 

“ Go without fear,” cried she. “ I know now that 
you will not forget the little sister you leave among 
the northern snows. Besides, you can hardly give 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


I5I 

a passing thought to ‘The Hermitage’ without be- 
ing reminded at the same time of the ‘Gray House.’ 
Apropos, who will overlook your business?” 

“ I count on asking your good father to undertake 
the task.” 

“My father!” cried she, with shining eyes. 

She experienced a new joy. Her father in Mau- 
rice’s place! What a bond betwixt them and be- 
tween the absent one and her! One might have 
thought she had just heard that the traveller would 
nevermore leave her presence. She herself began 
to discuss plans for the voyage, of which, in truth, 
C16gudrac was not thinking much just then. They 
spoke of New York. 

“You will see your cousin?” asked Irene. 

“ Assuredly. You know, then, he is now in New 
York?” 

Maurice learned, for the first time, that the vis- 
count had told his entire life and history to Irene 
von Oberkorn. But if the young Parisian had 
thought to dazzle his new confidante, he had gone 
the wrong way about it. Irene judged him 
with a severity the young hero, in all probability, 
would not have understood if he had guessed it. 
On the contrary, she had no adjective tender enough 
when she spoke of Alademoiselle Montdauphin. 

“You will see her at Paris?” she asked Maurice. 

‘“From one point of view, I should like to, from 
another I should have a certain dread. What 
should I say to her? After all, I fear she must have 
been imprudent.” 


52 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ Imprudent to trust herself to the plighted word 
of the man she adores?” 

There was so much indignant surprise in this 
exclamation that Maurice dared not explain his 
meaning further. As he kept silence, Irene asked 
him: 

“ If you were in your friend’s place, would you 
act as he is taking steps to act?” 

“ No,” said he gravely. 

“ But who knows ? Possibly you have a betrothed 
yourself in France?” 

“ I have a betrothed nowhere,” answered Clegue- 
rac, “in France no more than anywhere else.” 

This phrase, resting on the ground like a tennis- 
ball that no one cares to take up, finished the con- 
versation for that day. 

Cleguerac put himself steadfastly to harness, forc- 
ing himself to think of one thing alone, that he had 
only five days before him during which to prepare 
for his absence. 

During that time, Baron Oberkorn, who was in 
hiding in a corner of his house so as to give Mau- 
rice time to accomplish his task, reappeared before 
his daughter, trembling with anxiety. Irene re- 
garded him with her clairvoyant eyes, and under- 
stood at once that he knew all. She showed but 
little of what was passing in her heart, but, run- 
ning to her father, took the old man’s head be- 
tween her hands and kissed his forehead. 

“Let us love each other dearly, father!” she 
said in a firm but sorrowful voice. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


153 


“ Are you afraid my tenderness may not suffice 
you?” sighed the baron, convulsively embracing 
her. 

“Oh, no, indeed. Far, far from that. I have 
only one fear, that you should cease to love me,” 
answered she. 

Her gaze, apparently troubled with some faint 
or far-off apparition, recalled a look that he had 
sen in other eyes, eyes at that hour closed forever- 
more. 



XL 

Maurice de Cleguerac seemed to wake up pre- 
cisely at the hour when he ought to be falling 
asleep ; so he thought as he found himself stretched 
out on his berth in the sleeping-car from Wabi- 
goon. For the first time for nearly a week he was 
able to think, and, for the first time, permitted a 
certain inner voice, hitherto silenced by force of 
will, to put the question : 

“Why are you going away?” 

He had not earlier asked himself why he was 
going, simply because he had willed to go, and he 
knew that will, like virtue, plays a high game in 
certain cases to be looked at doubtingly. The 
mania for analysis is no better and no worse for the 
government of peoples than for individuals. That 
is why, since analysis is king in modern romance, 
good people are so rarely to be read about. 

A thing that proves Maurice had done well in 
not interrogating himself on the previous days is 
that, just now, his own resolution to go away as- 
tounded him, still more so the putting of it into 
practice. But he was too tired in body and spirit 
to push the reaction further. His sleeping-car was 
rolling Atlanticward through the frosty night; at 
the end of a few hours the motion of the train 
stupefied him to sleep. 


154 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


155 


He woke with daybreak. A great sadness seemed 
to load him down, that irritated him more than a 
rainy day succeeding a party of pleasure. Joy only 
should have filled his soul; every minute or two 
brought him a mile nearer France. It would have 
been a task of Hercules for him to be joyous. He 
could only keep thinking that he was going further 
and further from “ The Hermitage” and its neigh- 
borhood. Soon he began to think only of Irene. 
With love. In justice — hardly. But with heavy 
melancholy. 

Nevertheless Fraulein von Oberkorn had gone 
through their last interview, even the one in which 
they said good-by, without allowing a complaint, 
an avowal, a tear, hardly even a sigh to escape her. 
But this unmurmuring resignation, dolorous and 
sublime privilege of the races of the north and east, 
now greatly troubled Maurice, as it has troubled so 
many readers of Tolstoi, with a sharp, vibrating, 
passionate sensation of rebellion. Those great blue 
eyes pitilessly pursued him with a look in which no 
bitterness concealed the brand of grief. For sixty 
hours of forced reverie the look in those eyes burned 
into his. At parting he could have shown himself 
an honest man; had he not proved a cruel one? 
An exclamation whose masculine egotism he did 
not realize came constantly to his lips : 

“ Ah ! why did I ever know her?” 

He hoped that a meeting with Alain would cause 
him to forget this anxious complicated train of 
thought. But, to tell the truth of things, the two 


156 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

cousins were discontented, disenchanted with each 
other ; no mutual sympathy would flow on such a 
scene. 

As for Alain, one would have said he had never 
lived, and never reekoned to live, outside of Fifth 
Avenue. 

Only to see him, quite the Parisian still in general 
style, but with a studied note of American loudness, 
Maurice was ready to avow that the viscount car- 
ried the French name high in fashionable circles. 
The schedule of his exploits was far from giving 
the lie to his good fortune. He had made very 
many friends among young ladies of good society, 
that is to say, provided their fathers totalled their 
fortunes by five million dollars or over. He antici- 
pated a winter painfully overdone with invitations. 

‘‘You count on passing the winter in New 
York?” 

This question, whose significance he understood, 
hardly seemed to please the viscount. He re- 
sponded with some slight acerbity, in the tone of a 
man who has made up his mind to deal with a deli- 
eate subject and not revert to it. 

“ My father placed this ultimatum before me : 
either not to re-enter France or to enter it on my 
word of honor that I had forever renounced those 
dreams of the future ” 

“Dreams?” emphasized his eousin. 

“Let us not play on words. By remaining in 
New York I take the only intelligent line of eon- 
duct. My father, sooner or later, will tire of pay- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 1 5/ 

ing* the expenses of the war; that is to say, the ex- 
penses of the voyage.” 

“ The more so as you choose the most compen- 
dious of encampments,” remarked Maurice, point- 
ing to the fittings and hangings of one of the most 
ruinously-expensive hotels in America. 

Alain half closed his eyes with a merry smile, 
sat back in his rocker, and said, surrounding him- 
self with a luxurious cloud of Turkish tobacco : 

“ I should be silly to pass a good thing by. But 
if you will promise not to betray me, I will tell you 
one of the drollest things. I am getting in debt. 
In New York! I, who never seriously attempted 
- to run up accounts in Paris.” 

“Yes, it is rather comical,” agreed Cleguerac, 
without much thought of laughing. “ Getting into 
debt? May one ask why or for whom?” 

“ Aha ! for Gladys Pauvell. What do you think?” 

“For Gladys Pauvell?” repeated Maurice, hardly 
able to believe his ears. 

The Viscount de Lavandien burst into a hearty 
laugh at this virtuous interjection. 

“Ah, cousin, there’s a bit of sentiment that 
smacks of the Great North West a mile off. Though 
it is not the first time you have been in New York. 
Good Heavens ! I admit that Gladys compromises 
me a little, she takes possession of me, she monopo- 
lizes me. She invites me constantly to dinner at 
her parents’ house. In reason I return her civili- 
ties. You haven’t the least idea how much a sim- 
ple tete-a-tHe dinner costs at Delmonico’s.” 


58 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ No. But I cannot understand any better bow 
you can return the civility of the elder Pauvells by 
dining alone with the daughter in a restaurant.” 

“Milksop! fancy if I had to invite the whole 
family. There are eight of them. But the other 
seven do not count. Three-quarters of the time 
they know I am invited by Gladys solely in order 
that I should be seen at the table. But do not think 
I get off with an occasional dinner for two. This 
young person simply adores picnics, and it is I, 
generally, who am her cavalier. Ruinous, abso- 
lutely ruinous, these picnics. The carriage and 
pair — lucky when it is not a yacht — flowers, cham- 
pagne, musicians for a dance. One has not time to 
count one’s bank-bills as they fly. Over and above 
picnics, there is the theatre; often both kinds of 
amusement the same day. Or, say we go to the ball. 
A carriage for the night is the necessary thing — one 
hundred francs. As for bouquets, there is no rule. 
Do you know that in one season the florists of 
New York make as much money as those of Lon- 
don and Paris put together?” 

“On my honor, no,” said Maurice. 

“Well, as for me, I know it by experience. In 
brief, excellent cousin of mine, when you see my 
father, try to prepare him gently for my — revenge.” 

“ Your revenge?” 

“Yes. My father thwarts me in my inclinations. 
I strike him in his pocket. He exiles me. I will 
impoverish him. Dear Simone! they say you are 
too poor. Trot out your bank-notes and coupons 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


159 


for Gladys Pau veil’s fine eyes, who has millions of 
dollars. They are afraid I should dance with you 
— twenty louis for each evening of cotillons with 
the pretty American. They would prevent me 
from giving you a two-sou posy of violets — well, 
Gladys loves orchids and shall have them. Do you 
understand my scheme of vengeance?” 

“ It is exquisitely refined. One thing astonishes 
me, however, and it is this — who procures you the 
money?” 

The viscount stopped his rocker, and, lowering 
his voice as though some indiscreet ear might over- 
hear them, said: 

“ It is extremely simple. Pauvell is my medium, 
but he is also a banker. It is he who negotiates all 
my father’s American business. From that to ne- 
gotiating mine, there is but one step.” 

“And he has paid up?” 

“With a facility that did him honor. But, on 
the contrary, when I am forced to liquidate, I fore- 
see a much less enjoyable quarter of an hour before 
me.” 

“You will see that all will go well,” answered 
Maurice, looking at his watch. “ But I must leave 
you now to attend to a little business. My vessel 
sails to-morrow.” 

At the same instant a hotel servant approached 
Lavandien. 

“A visitor for monsieur in the ladies’ saloon.” 

“ It can only be Gladys,” said Alain. “ I should 
like you to see her. Do you mind?” 


l60 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

“ Well, I must confess this young person inter- 
ests me very much.” 

“Why?” asked the viscount, turning. 

“Simply because I have the honor to be your 
cousin,” answered Cleguerac evasively. 

By a very maze of corridors and staircases they 
reached a sort of boudoir having a separate entrance 
on a side street. On walls hung with pale blue 
damask were hung pictures of inestimable value by 
modern masters, in gorgeous frames, behind plate 
glass so thick they seemed like aquarelles. Each 
of these masterpieces bore a tablet with the name 
of the painter, the subject, and, most imposing of 
all, the colossal price paid for the acquisition of the 
canvas, a custom that false modesty alone will long 
prevent from coming into vogue in France. Yet 
what a precious guide is such arithmetic for half- 
educated admiration! 

Before the mantel-piece, which seemed to bend 
beneath its weight of bronze, Gladys was standing 
with one dainty foot on the fender of the open fire- 
place. She was of medium height, admirably pro- 
portioned, really pretty, with that evident but, in 
truth, attractive hot-house look that eight out of 
ten wealthy American beauties possess. Her toi- 
lette, not in faultless taste, but interesting, was 
hardly in unison with the hour and the place. One 
would have said a millionaire Parisienne of the 
middle classes, somewhat eccentric, coming from 
a wedding at Saint-Philippe. But Gladys had only 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. l6l 

come out to take the air and shop as the spirit 
might move her. 

“Good-day,” she said, shaking hands with her 
friend Lavandien. “ I was passing by the Windsor, 
and came in to see if you were here, and have a 
cup of tea with you. They keep the best caviare 
here in New York.” 

Alain ordered the necessary refreshments, then 
he presented Cleguerac. 

“ I am so glad to see you,” she said, with a hand- 
shake like her previous one. “ The viscount makes 
my head spin with stories of the Great North West. 
And, you know, we are brought up from children 
to think that a prairie farmer eats without a fork, 
hardly ever changes his clothes, and sleeps in his 
boots.’'’ 

“When he is fortunate enough to possess boots,” 
emphasized Maurice, with perfect seriousness. 

“Good,” said Gladys, having examined her new 
acquaintance. “ There are exceptions to every rule. 
But,” pointing to Alain, “what idea did this young 
man take into his head to remain a month in the 
desert — what eccentricity!” 

Maurice understood that Miss Pauvell was un- 
aware of even the existence of a rival. Without 
looking at his cousin, who was beginning to look 
rather anxious, he answered : 

“ The whim of a tourist who wishes to see every- 
thing there is to be seen in a country, the ugly 
things as well as the beautiful. But, on taking 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


162 

stock, our friend Lavandien had far too good taste 
not to come back to the beautiful.” 

“ Nobody like a Frenchman for dexterity in turn- 
ing compliments. I hope you make a long stay in 
New York.” 

“ Alas ! what should a prairie farmer do in the 
metropolis? I sail to-morrow, and even now I must 
leave you in order to choose my cabin on the 
Savoie'* 

“ Nonsense. One of the bell-boys of the Wind- 
sor would make a better choice than you could.” 

Cleguerac insisted, saying he had other business. 

“Well, you will come and dine this evening at 
our house. I shall be enchanted. I will invite one 
of my lady friends to insure a filirtatory equilib- 
rium. Eight o’clock; say you will come.” 

At eight o’clock Maurice, escorted by Alain, 
mounted the steps that led to the Pauvell front 
door. They traversed a vestibule of medium size 
all glittering. with new bronzes; then a first saloon, 
free of all furniture, that was kept for dancing; 
then another, cumbered with costly rugs. At last 
they came to the family sitting-room, where were 
present not only Gladys, but Father Pauvell and 
Mother Pauvell, and five young Pauvells of differ- 
ent sexes, whose ages varied from nine to seven- 
teen. These personages, especially the younger 
ones, were talking together with a great chatter, 
and hardly turned their heads till the moment 
Gladys chose to introduce the new guest. Cle- 
guerac received seven separate hand-shakes in 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


163 


seven separate styles. When he had gone the 
rounds of presentation, Florence Kennedy, one of 
Gladys’ best friends, who had fortunately been at 
liberty, made her appearance with a mighty rust- 
ling of satins and silks. Perhaps she would hardly 
have caused a saint’s downfall by her beauty, too 
violet-like to be suggestive, but she would, by con- 
trast, have killed a dozen of our most refined belles’ 
toilettes by her dress. True, she had herself robed 
in Philadelphia, but we do not as yet appreciate the 
growing superiority of American costumes. Look 
out for surprises in the future. 

Gladys presented Cleguerac to her friend ; then 
they passed into the dining-room, whose table was 
almost invisible under an infinity of objects, look- 
ing like white metal from their sturdy obsolete 
shapes, like silver by their glow and glitter. A 
network of living creepers interlaced with orchids 
sprang from the midst of all, and festooned around 
a great cage of frosted glass containing a nest of 
incandescent lights. This luxurious screen ren- 
dered one half the guests completely invisible to 
the other. At one side of the table they might be 
commemorating a funeral, without attracting the 
notice of the opposite moiety. Maurice, who had 
promised himself to observe, for future guidance, 
the mutual attitude of Alain and Gladys, would not 
even have been able to say, when all were seated, 
whereabouts in New York those interesting young 
people at that moment were. 

To tell the truth, his neighbor left him little leis- 


164 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


ure to give to the rest of the human race. Flor- 
ence belonged to the category of American exuber- 
ants. After the soup, Cleguerac knew already that 
she was quite a general; that Ciwillier was the only 
place in Paris where one can get a decent lunch ; 
that X. had made a miss-fire of his Academy picture 
last year, and that she had traversed the ocean 
eleven times, which uneven number indicated as 
well as explained that Mademoiselle Kennedy had 
found herself in France at the era when a certain 
event first called her home to America. 

“ You have known the French from indeed a very 
early age,” said Maurice to his neighbor. ‘‘What 
do you think of them?” 

“As a nation as a whole,” answered she, without 
hesitation, “ I put them first in the front flight — 
after us. In the individual, with some exceptions, 
I find two grave drawbacks : they take flirtation too 
seriously and marriage too lightly.” 

“As for flirtation,” protested Cleguerac, “fear 
nothing from me; I am one of the exceptions.” 

“ Oh, you! You have travelled,” said she. “ But 
you have not said how you would behaye as a hus- 
band.” 

“ Detestably ; so let me be held up as a warning. 
I should be the misery of the lady who married me. ” 

“ I thank you for warning me in good time. But 
the precaution is superfluous. Twenty-fiye years 
of age, I am invulnerable.’* 

“Who knows?” 

“ It is so, I assure you. I have decided it myself. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


165 


I have the weakness to think that among all earthly- 
creatures warmed by the sun in his twenty-four- 
hour race, there is no happier mortal than Florence 
Kennedy.” 

“It seems you, also, are among the exceptions,” 
answered Maurice, who suddenly saw before him, 
by sheer force of contrast, Irene’s pale face as they 
bade each other good-by. 

He passed his hand over his forehead, and, too 
much master of himself to transmit his melancholy 
to his neighbor, returned : 

“Well, happily, I also am invulnerable.” 

“Who knows?” asked she in her turn, with one 
of those pretty glances which we sometimes call 
“wicked.” 

“Oh, I do not underestimate the danger I am 
running,” said Maurice, laughing. “Anybody but 
myself, in the position I occupy at this moment, 
would be a lost man. But I have here, over my 
heart, a talisman that takes away all fear.” 

“Your sweetheart’s portrait?” 

“ No. A steamer ticket for Havre. To-morrow, 
at this very hour, I shall already be unable to see 
the lights of Sandy Hook.” 

“ Fie, coward! But do not think yourself forever 
saved. People go — but they come back — and 

then Behold your friend; that poor young 

man had the energy to make a campaign against 
the Indians, to cross the Rocky Mountains. What 
serves him now that valor of a day? I think the 
Parisian ladies can put on mourning dresses.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


1 66 

Cleguerac felt liis lieart stabbed once more. He 
was thinking now not of Irene, but of that other 
young girl whom he did not know, and whose duty 
it was to prepare her to put mourning on her illu- 
sions. 

At sight of his sad look Florence Kennedy 
thought he was continuing the jest. 

“Come, come,” said she, “take courage. We 
know how to be generous from time to time. Af- 
ter all, we may well take pity on one victim out of 
two.” 

At these words she followed Mrs. Pauvell, who 
was regaining the drawing-room with Gladys and 
the younger children, leaving the men to claret, 
or to those delicious Havana cigars so ill-known in 
our country. When the two parties rejoined each 
other, it was Gladys who seized on Alain’s friend, 
probably after the safe counsels of the viscount. 
They talked together seriously for an hour, with- 
out allusion to the future. Only, as they were 
about to part. Miss Pauvell said to Cldgudrac : 

“You know me pretty well by now; while, as for 
me, I have known you quite a long time. Perhaps 
you will be able to give us a day.” 

He could not but acknowledge that Gladys was 
worthy of sympathy and even friendship. Besides, 
she seemed quite sedate by the side of Florence 
Kennedy. Her gravest fault was, if she only knew 
it, that she had come in second. 

However that may be, regaining the Windsor on 
foot with his cousin, Maurice spoke neither of Flor- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


167 


ence nor of Gladys, nor the opulent hospitality of the 
Pauvells. Irene von Oberkorn and her recent ill- 
ness were the subjects of their talk. As to the con- 
valescence and the many incidents that had pre- 
ceded and followed, Clegu^rac, be it understood, 
spoke no word. Alain, on his part, made no sort 
of mention of Simone, which angered the Canadian. 

“After all,” said the latter, turning on his bed 
to try to get to sleep, “ I am not the guardian of 
Mademoiselle de Montdauphin’s happiness. Thank 
Heaven, I am charged with nobody’s happiness.” 

Hardly had this sigh of egotistic satisfaction es- 
caped his breast, when he saw Irene’s lovely eyes 
seeking his in mute reproach, as though to say to 
him: 

“Unkind! On whom, then, if not on you, de- 
pends my happiness?” 


XIII. 

General de Berdons passed two hours every 
day reading the papers in his library, the double 
doors being rigorously closed, so that his daughter, 
whose salon was adjacent, might not hear him 
swear. Occasions for swearing are not wanting 
nowadays when we read newspapers, above all if 
one has made a hobby-horse of honor, justice, right, 
good sense, and grammar, which was the case with 
the general of division, retired two years earlier, 
without counting that there ran in his veins the 
blood of the Cevennes. But all causes us to think 
that the old warrior rather sought than avoided this 
daily craze, for the faintest oath was never heard 
from his mouth after the hour of ten in the morn- 
ing save on the days when he felt the working of 
the bullet still within his frame. Evidently this 
ante-meridian disgorgement set him at liberty for 
the rest of the twenty-four hours, and even placed 
him in a position not to shock Marie de Berdon’s 
pink delicate ears with a too military word, whose 
mother he had now replaced with the ponderous 
tenderness of a paladin watching over a princess. 

The general had almost gone through his course, 
one November morning, when the servant an- 

i68 


Love knows no Law. 169 

iiounced Monsieur Maurice de Cleguerac. His sur- 
prise was such that four or five oaths escaped him 
that had been apparently lurking in his system, for- 
tunately before Clegudrac’s actual appearance. 

A quarter of an hour, at least, was necessary in 
order to renew the acquaintance. The young man 
related that he had embarked at Havre the evening 
before ; that his first course had been direct to his 
old chief, whom, he said, he found just the same 
spite of his “civif’ overcoat; that Mademoiselle 
Marie by that time ought to have grown into a very 
lovely young lady. Then came the inevitable 
question : 

“ What in the dickens was he doing there? Was 
it a leave-taking or a retreat?” 

“•Ah ! my dear general, if you could only enlighten 
me!” answered Maurice. “ We will talk it all over, 
for I like best to give you all at once the theme of 
the manoeuvre, as we used to call it in the dear old 
days. For simple nobodies, I am on a visit of 
amusement, and to set in order my affairs. But it 
is to you, and to you only, I am paying this visit. 

Faith, I feel I can no more explain it to you 

I must try, nevertheless. Over yonder I have a 
neighbor. That neighbor has- a daughter.” 

“With whom you are in love?” 

“ Alas, it is she — I speak to you as to my con- 
fessor — it is she who has got it into her head that I 
am worthy of her affections. I hasten to avow that 
she has almost no other choice.” 

“A good girl, the little one?” 


170 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

“Good, pretty, gracious, devoted, intelligent, of 
tlie old nobility, and not yet seventeen.” 

“Aba! after all I bad read, I did not tbink tbe 
prairie bad sucb inhabitants. And you feel no at- 
tachment for this young person?” 

“ I felt none when I used to see her every day. 
Since I can no longer see her, I begin to think of 
her. But I cannot tell you exactly how I feel. A 
sense of anxious pity, it seems likely.” 

“ Well, my boy, marry her first, and analyze 
your feelings for her at leisure. Has she any 
money?” 

“ Not a sou.” 

“The devil! And how is it with you?” 

“ I have nothing to complain of at present, nor 
any reason to despair of the future.” 

“ Well then, my friend, if you have only to stretch 
out your hand to obtain a good woman I as- 

sure you such are rare, at least in Paris. I only 
know one, but that one is not for your fine eyes. 
If my son-in-law lived as much as across the street, 
I should find it too far. Reflect well. Suppose 
you waited till your fortune was made. It would 
take at least another ten years. You would be 
forty — which is too. old. You would be weary of 
the strife, you would have lost touch of the world, 
and you would have lost, in solid happiness, the 
ten best years of life. So, my brave Maurice, wed 
your litle sweetheart without delay. I only see one 
sacrifice on your part — a financial one.” 

“There is another,” said Maurice, his eyes fixed 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. I71 

on the general. “ Her father, the Baron d’Ober- 
korn, is a Prussian gentleman.” 

“The devil run away with you!” said M. de Ber- 
dons, crushing his journal between his hands, and 
rising from his seat. 

But this impetuous movement drew a cry of pain 
from him, followed by an explosive oath too volu- 
minous to be incorporated in the text of an ordinary 
novel. He had “felt that bullet.” 

“A Prussian beggar-girl,” he groaned, taking 
hold of the mantel-piece in order to regain his seat. 

“My poor general, it is not my fault,” said Cle- 
guerac. 

“Evidently it is not your fault. But, frankly, 
you are one of the uncanniest of friends. One day 
you tread on a gentleman’s toes — it proves to be 
your chief in one department. You kill your ad- 
versary in a duel. And then you are obliged, as 
things turn out, to feed the family. Then you 
take a fancy for the only woman, perhaps, there is 
within your purview for espousal ; she turns out a 
Prussian.” 

“ But, my good general, had I wished to proceed 
with the affair, I should not be here.” 

“Good luck to you! But would you have de- 
parted had you been certain that things ran no 
risk of going farther? I do not say you did wrong 
in coming away. What I do say, and I repeat it, 
is that you are playing for high stakes. Look you, 
my boy, I know you. I have followed your career. 
I have seen you come back from a year’s travel 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


1^2 

without having forgotten your account with a poor 
devil who, after all, had not done much to you. 
And you wish to make me believe that in three 
months you could forget a girl who adores you, 

and whom You did not look at yourself in a 

looking-glass, just now, when you were speaking.” 

“ I am not much accustomed to looking-glasses,” 
said Maurice, smiling. 

“ Well, my warrior, I strongly advise you to re- 
new the habit — morally, at all events. Survey 
yourself ; study yourself. I have the intimate con- 
viction that the strongest men do not act as they 
would wish to when love is in question. Only, 
unless a man is an imbecile or a criminal, he must 
know where he is going, in order to act logically.” 

“General, I will see you again often. You are 
a good doctor, and I am assured that the Parisian 
ladies are charming remedies.” 

“Yes, make a pretence to laugh!” said M. de 
Berdons, shrugging his shoulders. “You have the 
agreeable alternative of either caring for a lady 
here you cannot marry, because she would refuse 
to go over yonder, or loving a woman over yonder 
who ” 

Brusquely the old man broke off, and sat down 
again in his chair with more precaution than he 
had taken in rising. As he did not seem to be 
willing to finish his sentence, Cleguerac remarked : 

“You stopped, I think, at the very moment when 
the conversation was becoming interesting.” 

“ I should like to see you less interested, my dear 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


173 

Maurice/’ he replied. “What would you have? 
In France, for one reason or another, partiotism has 
become sentimental. In the days of Fontenoy the 
gentlemen of the opposing armies played cards and 
caroused together on the eve of battle. The next 
day they met as brave men meet. To-day we do 
not even wish to breathe the perfume of a flower 
that had its nurture on the enemy’s soil. What 
difference do you see between these two kinds of 
patriots?” 

“But little, intrinsically,” said Cleguerac, “since 
we kill each other now more quickly and easily 
than the warriors of the olden time. Only, for- 
merly, it was two aristocracies that were fighting 
each other; for even the simple soldier of yore, 
separated by choice or chance from the rest of the 
nation, was, in a fashion, an aristocrat. To-day it 
is two nations who meet to fight.” 

“ Good, but the aristocracy of to-day has one priv- 
ilege: that of setting an example to the people. 
For the rest we know, you and I who are of the 
trade, that we shall never retake Alsace and Lor- 
raine with sentiment. But if we criticise senti- 
ment, we shall be just as well advised as the hus- 
band who mocks at his wife for going to mass. 
I think that men like ourselves ought to bow to this 
sentimentality of patriotism.” 

“ Conclusion : it is a crime to marry a German 
woman.” 

“ Not at all. But it would be better not to marry 
a German. And, notice here, my dear fellow, that 


174 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


honor, as we understand it, consists not only in 
avoiding crimes, but in doing the best deeds we can 
perform. All this, let it be an understood thing, is 
between ourselves. And now, let us pay court to my 
daughter, so that she may invite us to breakfast.” 

Mademoiselle de Berdons, a little slender lady, 
fine and flexible as the blade of a Spanish sword, 
merits a place in the highly interesting category of 
pretty plain ladies. Her complexion of almost 
gypsy brownness was yet exceedingly clear; her 
nose pronounced and prominent withal, not aqui- 
line ; mouth a little too large, the philosopher’s and 
orator’s mouth, formed a somewhat striking en- 
semble, whose imagined want of harmony became a 
sparkling unison when lighted up by two magnifi- 
cent eyes. 

Maurice had known her as a child. He found 
her a young woman now, after an absence of many 
years. For the first time in their lives the words 

mademoiselle, ” and “ monsieur, ” came to their lips. 
But the transition was accomplished on both sides 
with extreme facility, and the general, whose pater- 
nal fondness was by no means a stranger to certain 
of the pangs of jealousy, was reassured by the first 
minutes of their intercourse. 

The conversation, besides, quickly took on more 
of the character of an “interview,” and one might 
have supposed that Marie de Berdons was gather- 
ing materials for an article on the North West, es- 
pecially upon “The Hermitage” farm and manu- 
factories. During breakfast she made an incidental 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


175 


allusion to the viscount’s sojourn on the prairie. 
Cl^guerac was certain he had not mentioned the 
count’s name, for he had calculated to steer clear of 
all distressing subjects. Much astonished at seeing 
this young Parisienne so very well informed, he 
asked : 

“ Has Lavandien’s visit to ^The Hermitage’ then 
made such a noise?” 

Mademoiselle de Berdons blushed lightly, and 
bit her lips. 

“ I did not say this visit made a noise,” answered 
she. “ Somebody spoke of it before me, and I felt 
interested, the traveller not being by any means 
unknown to some of my partieular friends.” 

Immediately she turned the conversation, and 
questioned Cleguerac upon his society projects. 
The latter assured the lady he intended to go out 
a good deal. 

“ But,” added he, “for the moment I am obliged 
to do like the poet who remained in bed all day for 
lack of a coat.” 

“Well,” ordered Mademoiselle de Berdons, “see 
that you have a coat to put on within eight days. 
You will receive an invitation to a ball.” 

“ May one ask at whose house?” 

“The Countess Gravino’s.” 

“ But I do not know this countess. Is she old, 
young ” 

“She is about the same age as her husband’s 
nobility — that is to say, she is not wrinkled,” put in 
the general. 


76 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ What matters the Countess Gravino’s personal- 
ity to you ? The essential thing for you is that you 
will dance the cotillion at her house — with me.” 

“ ‘ What odds what flask, as long as one is tipsy, 
cried Maurice, laughing. But now I leave you to 
run to my tailor’s.” 

When Cleguerac had gone, M. de Berdons grum- 
bled without looking at his daughter : 

“You know he returns to America in March. 
He has yet ten years of prairie-life before him.” 

“Ah, how unhappy I am!” cried the merry girl 
with a deep dramatic sigh. “ I felt myself ready 
to love ” 

Then, breaking into laughter, she embraced her 
father, regained her apartment, and covered two 
pages feverishly with writing, like one who hastens 
to transmit great news. The envelope, sent off 
within the hour, bore the name of Mademoiselle 
de Montdauphin, 


XIV. 


The Countess Gravino, previously presented to 
the reader, possessed fortune and worldly knowl- 
edge in equal proportions, which is paying her per- 
spicacity no paltry compliment. To this was joined 
the personal advantage of high birth. In her draw- 
ing-rooms, in addition to the pretty amenities of 
the old regime, which the hostess thought it worth 
while still to preserve, you were endowed with 
the extended liberties and charters of the new. 
Somebody once compared her salon to the great 
fair at Nijni- Novgorod because the two ends of 
the earth have there a meeting and a resting-place. 

Maurice, conducted by Mademoiselle de Berdons, 
with the general as whipper-in, arrived in good 
time — that is to say, at 1 1 o’clock in the evening — 
at the Hotel Gravino, on the night of the ball. His 
invitation had been prompt; it was no common 
copperplate of pretentious society, but an autograph 
card from the countess, containing two specially 
familiar lines. Seeing Cleguerac enter, without 
ceremony she extended her hand, and, chasing 
from her lips the stereotyped smile of the lady of 
the house, who has to bow to hundreds, she scanned 
his face with eyes that seemed to know him. 

‘‘ It was very naughty of you to leave your name 
177 


12 


178 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


yesterday without asking whether I was at home or 
not,” said she. “ I should have received you'' 

“ Before being presented I could hardly be bold 
enough ” 

“We shall see,” said the countess, lifting her 
magnificent shoulders, from which her dress was 
suspended only by ribbons. 

“ You would signify that a wild man of my spe- 
cies is not held by the rules of ordinary society?” 

“We will say that that was what I meant. You 
wull know some day soon.” 

Some more guests arrived. The countess took 
her leave of Maurice for the moment : 

“ To-night I am the victim of the mob. I shall 
not be able to say three words to you But come 
to-morrow at 5 o’clock, and we will have a long, 
long talk.” 

“Adieu, papa!” the general’s daughter was say- 
ing. “You know we sup seated, here, at little 
tables. Be good to yourself. From time to time 
I will send Cl^uerac for the news.” 

Maurice, hearing these words, opened his eyes 
wide. The general grumbled some answer, the 
ever-increasing crowd cut short all protestation. 

“ Left all alone?” asked the Canadian, carried on, 
like his companion, by the current. 

“Yes and no,” said she. “ Look.” 

They found themselves in a large and lofty 
chamber, specially reserved for the gambols of the 
younger ones, who came here to devote themselves 
to conversation and the dancC; under the eyes only 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


179 


of heaven and the musicians. However — and Marie 
de Berdons directed Celgu^rac’s attention to this 
important detail — of the three doors which con- 
nected the room with the neighboring salon, only 
two were closed. The third, with both wings open, 
was only barred by a line of rose-colored ribbon, 
stretched from one side to the other, so as to 
show that the elderly gentlemen sequestered in 
the night asylum” were simply prisoners on 
parole. 

*‘This is something new to me,” said Maurice. 
“ It makes one think of the glazed partitions be- 
tween two compartments of the same carriage, to 
prevent monsieur the assassin from working too 
much at his ease.” 

Marie de Berdon shook her head and replied pro- 
foundly : 

Oh, I assure you, there is very little assassina- 
tion nowadays. It is rather our money than our 
lives that is menaced ; but we have the examples 
of former days to put us on our guard.” 

Cleguerac, more and more surprised, observed 
the tableau before him with all his eyes. 

Underneath the light prodigally cast by many 
dozen Edison lamps, groups formed exclusively of 
young men and young ladies were gathering in 
every corner. Hands were clasped as calmly as 
though at a club ; conversation flowed on a footing 
of quiet equality; people were laughing without 
making a racket over it, amusing each other with- 
out exaggeration. In vain Maurice passed in re- 


8o 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


view tlie ladies’ faces, thinking to find a friend or 
two of his boyhood long since married. 

“Where are the young married ladies?” asked 
Maurice of his guide. 

“Where are they? At the theatre, at serious 
evenings, at elegant dinners — even some of them 
in bed. This evening’s ball is what we call a white 
one. When these ladies meet us in society, the 
world is' theirs. The gentlemen prefer it, natu- 
rally.” 

“Why ‘naturally’?” 

. “ Look you, monsieur : do you take me for a goose 
it is droll to hear quacking? Or have you never 
been in the Parisian world?” 

“ I have led two or three dozen cotillons, but it 
was so long ago. You would not believe me if I 
told you that at that era a mother exacted of a 
young man that he should be introduced before 
dancing with her daughter.” 

“ Oh ! and we could only dance within a certain 
circle, whose centre is the maternal sofa. Then, 
what conversations! A young man would marry 
us after dancing with us during two winters — and 
he would not know us.” 

“Whereas, now,” answered Maurice, thinking of 
Lavandien, “ this same young man dances and talks 
with you absolutely at his ease, knows you to the 
tips of the fingers — and does not marry you.” 

“ No, certainly. But I pity you, from my heart, 
for having no illusions left.” 

“You speak like papa, and serious people. No 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. l8l 

illusions! The words are always on their lips. 
Well, is it our fault if we were born at the end of 
the century and not the beginning? As for me, I 
confess right out: I find myself happy as I am, 
and I decline to become miserable. Either you 
shall bury me in the winding-sheet of some crea- 
ture old enough to be my mother, or I will marry 
somebody who will love me and deserve that I 
should love him. At least I have the illusion that 
such a one exists. Where? We may never meet. 
About that I know nothing. But patience: once 
more I am reconciled with my lot, and I assure you 
one can amuse one’s self very well in the world 
without illusions.” 

In the mean time the “ Boston” was in progress. 
Maurice’s name was inscribed on the first line of 
Marie de Berdons’ programme; and, presently, on 
beholding a man of thirty return to the uses of 
adolescence, more than one frown was seen around 
the rooms. But Maurice, after a stay of many 
years on the American continent, danced as well as 
anybody. Not only did Mademoiselle de Berdons 
never seem to tire, but that malicious young per- 
son, in the intervals, recounted, for the benefit 
of whoever might be able to overhear, that the 
new-comer possessed a domain in Canada as large 
as the canton of Beauce. Which was all that was 
wanted to make him the fashion. Toward i o’clock 
in the morning, half a dozen dancers had passed 
underneath the rose-colored ribbon to inform their 
mothers in the “night asylum” that it would be a 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


182 

good thing to have a certain M. de Clegudrac pay 
them a visit — “ the tall, slender man who resembled 
an officer of chasseurs (the ideal of the day) , though 
not yet decorated.’* 

Unhappily two people attacked the Maurice ped- 
estal which the rest were so assiduously building. 
One was General de Berdons, who, questioned as to 
his daughter’s new friend, loyally declared that the 
handsome dancer, as regarded fortune, had only 
expectations, and those not of the best. The other 
was the Countess Gravino, who, more than once, 
following her guest with her eyes without the lat- 
ter’s knowledge, appeared to have determined, for 
some reason or other, that he should not be allowed 
to make his way too fast — outside her own house. 

During the truce that precedes the cotillon, the 
mothers passed the order of the day to their daugh- 
ters: 

“ Nothing serious with your Monsieur de Cl^gud- 
rac. Do you understand? Dance with him, if he 
amuses you; but do me the honor not to become in 
any way entangled.” 

After these salutary warnings, some of the young 
persons discovered that they had made certain cler- 
ical errors on their programmes. Poor Maurice 
profited by the opportunity to go and pay a visit to 
the general, who was sleeping like a gendarme, his 
eyes open, all the. while feigning to talk with a 
neighbor not much more wide-awake than himself. 

“ Well, young man, have you been amusing your- 
self?” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


183 


“ Prodigiously. I hear and see all sorts of ex- 
traordinary things. Just now a very distinguished- 
looking young gentleman said to his partner: 
* Would you like my escort to the drinking-trough?’ 
I fear I have yet a good deal to learn in the way of 
society small- talk. But I suppose it is indispensa- 
ble.” 

“ As for me, I envy my porter’s lot, who is not 
obliged to let in his lodgers after midnight, and I 
say to that good lady there, almost in tears with 
fatigue, that they make fools of us when they 
oblige us to do a footman’s duty. The real ones 
have the chance of taking a doze in a corner, or 
visiting a drinking-place across the way, while 
their exits are luxuriously perfumed with their mis- 
tress’ cloaks. What are we doing here? Why do 
we not organize ourselves, as in the case of board- 
ing-schools, into an omnibus service, to conduct 
the scholars home to their parents when the classes 
are over?” 

“Having the honor of knowing you so little,” 
said Clegu^rac, “ I am astonished at so much res- 
ignation on your part — though cloaked with irony.” 

“ I am resigned. In the first place, I know my 
daughter’s nature. With her it does not do to pass 
by a hair’s breadth the permitted limit. And then, 
I may either take it or leave it. At the start, I am 
recalcitrant. I fortify myself in an arm-chair by 
the side of her and hold to my point. Do you 
know what always happens ? The little one is left 
upon her chair — it is the order of the day. Twice 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


184 

her dancing fellows come around, excusing them- 
selves inasmuch as they have sprained their ankles. 
The world is a power. One may pass it by. But 
one must not try and be different from the world 
while in it.” 

At this instant Marie de Berdons appeared. She 
came to ascertain how her father was feeling, and 
at the same time to ask Maurice to join the cotil- 
lon she was forming. 

“Will you not stay five- minutes?” said the gen- 
eral. 

“ No,” said his daughter gravely. “ It would be 
bad form. And the dancing-room is by no means 
gay. It makes me think of the painting of ‘The 
Summons of the Condemned during the Terror. ’ 
Let us save ourselves, monsieur. We have but to 
send for our chariot.” 

She flev/ away with her partner, throwing the 
general a smile which was equivalent to a kiss; 
and the old man sadly thought of the chariot that 
would come some day or other, soon, all flounced 
with white satin and lace, to take away his beloved 
daughter. 

The cotillon would have been no new thing to 
Cleguerac, but for the strange scene and strange 
figures and faces. Each lady was provided before- 
hand with a beautiful bag containing fans painted 
by hand, tablets enriched with microscopic watches, 
garden hats, little cages holding some rare singing- 
bird. A lot of handsome canes, travelling-clocks, 
cigarette-cases, elegant knick-knacks, were distrib- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


185 


11 ted to the gentlemen. When these rare and 
costly presents had been distributed, the conductor 
of the cotillon passed to those who were unpro- 
vided with flowers, embroidered scarfs and other 
pretty things to bring out their neglected graces. 
But just then no less than twenty couples, suddenly 
overcome with fatigue, beat a retreat, to the pro- 
found amazement of Maurice. When he protested 
against this fashion of commerically- valuable souve- 
nirs, his partner observed: 

‘‘What! you have ceased to be a philosopher. 
Do you not see that these useful presents for us 
stand in the stead of the pinch of ashes in mid- 
carnival: ‘Remember, young marriageable lady, 
that love is nothing here below, and money every- 
thing.' Some such phrase I think I hear every 
time my partner puts five louis in my hand in the 
form of a fan or bit of jewelry.” 

‘'Heavens, how I pity you!” sighed Cleguerac. 

“ I am not to be pitied, because it seems I have 
a wedding-portion. By the way, does it ever hap- 
pen, out on the prairie, that man falls in love with 
a girl for her beauty?” 

“Perhaps,” said Maurice. 

And for several minutes he forgot the great Pa- 
risian fete, its toilettes, the music, the great hot, 
shining, perfumed room itself, to see, in a little cot- 
tage half-hid by pallid snow in another hemisphere, 
two eyes that he felt fixed on his, notwithstanding 
the miles of land and prairie that rolled between 
them. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


1 86 

At the same instant 'another look, not accustomed 
to remain unanswered when it spoke, vainly envel- 
oped the dreamer with their influences, eloquent of 
less mysterious sentiments. The cotillon was over ; 
the couples streamed steadily supperward. The 
Countess Gravino’s superb fan touched Maurice on 
the shoulder. He turned, relinquishing Made- 
moiselle de Berdons’ arm. The countess said to 
him : 

“ You have bored yourself to death, which might 
have been foreseen. An eagle invited into a dove- 
cote. But the idea was none of mine; I should 
never have dared — it was one of this young per- 
son’s. To make up, it is not too much to offer you 
a place at my particular table.” 

“Our table — is already organized,” said Made- 
moiselle de Berdons resolutely. 

The countess insisting, Marie de Berdons whis- 
pered four words in her ear. 

“Always politic,” answered the mistress of the 
mansion. “ In fine, my gentleman, since I cannot 
make you obey, even in my own house, do not for- 
get that you are to pay me a visit to-morrow, or, 
rather, this very evening. An revoir, man of steel. 
May my champagne help you to forget your fights 
with buffaloes and Indians.” 

“Your friend actually wishes to make me out a 
living illustration from Gustave Aymard,” said 
Maurice, laughing. 

“ I do not know what she wants to do with you,” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


187 


answered Mademoiselle de Berdons, “but every- 
body to his rights. For the moment you belong to 
me. One. hour more and you will be free.” 

While speaking, the authoritative young lady 
was conducting Maurice to her table, where she 
placed him on the right. Between the general and 
his daughter he beheld seated a very beautiful 
young lady he had already remarked. He had even 
asked Marie de Berdons who the unknown was, but 
in the flurry of the cotillon his words obtained 
but scanty notice. Unfolding his napkin, he re- 
newed the question. “I will tell you presently,” 
was the response. 

Cleguerac’s neighbor was “a daughter of the 
gods, divinely tall,” which is either a calamity or 
a glory, according to whether she is also “ divinely 
fair.” Still incomplete in certain contours, in atti- 
tudes and gestures girlishly not yet quite “strong,” 
she was yet put together with all the finished 
graces of a piece of statuary. To follow out the 
simile, this superb creature gave at first the 
vaguely chilling impression of a fine work of art for 
which it is not easy to find a suitable place in or- 
dinary houses. 

“When this chef-d’oeuvre fills out she will be 
worthy of a king. But lover-kings, in these our 
days, are rare.” 

Beholding this lovely face, whose smile, fre- 
quently forced, disappeared without fading away, 
with a brusque show of charming dimples, one 


t88 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


might suppose that the young girl herself under- 
stood all the difficulties of the problem she pre- 
sented. But the no less sudden flashing-up of the 
joy of life, the triumphant return of a smile as 
radiant as a springtide morning soon showed that 
she counted for its solution on her beauty, on her 
star, and on her king. 

Meanwhile, Marie de Berdons, who presided, had 
turned the conversation to the Great North West. 
Cleguerac recounted certain adventures, and de- 
picted his prairie-life with modesty and good sense. 
His mysterious neighbor on the right listened with- 
out looking at him, without eating, crumbling her 
bread with long pink fingers that some mysterious 
trembling seemed to agitate. 

“ What you miss, I should imagine, is a visitor 
now and then,” said Mademoiselle de Berdons. 

Cleguerac opened his mouth to answer that he 
had received precisely one the previous summer; 
but, mindful of the telegraphic catastrophe to the 
Wabigoon banquet, he became desirous of recon- 
noitering. 

“Do you know Alain de Lavandien?” he asked 
evasively. 

A general exclamation showed him that he was 
hemmed in by friends and acquaintances of the 
viscount. At the same time certain tell-tale looks 
were turned on Simone. But she had carried to 
her lips a cup, above which, as behind a mask, ap- 
peared only two more than half-veiled eyes. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 1 89 

“You have perhaps seen Alain in America?” 
said one of the young men. 

“ I left him,” prudently answered Maurice, “in a 
fair way of learning English in New York.” 

“ At college?” 

“No: with a millionaire who transacts his busi- 
ness for him.” 

“ I hope the millionaire has a daughter?” 

“ He has indeed — several. But Gladys Pauvell 
merits all attention, seeing the tender age of the 
others.” 

“ A miracle !” said the unknown young man. “ I 
always thought that Lavandien was no ordinary 
fellow. Whereabouts is he? At the conjugation 
of verbs or the conjunction?” 

Maurice retorted, tempted, as often happens, by 
a catch- word: 

“ I think he is at the participles.” 

He stopped short at these words, at sight of his 
pretty neighbor’s face. She had placed her hand 
upon her chin, and was looking strangely at Cle- 
guerac. Concentrated anguish, profound pride, gave 
her at once a hard and heart-breaking aspect. -The 
one who had spoken so inconsiderately trembled, 
first struck with a suspicion, then a dreadful cer- 
tainty. Evidently it was Mademoiselle de Mont- 
dauphin in person who had been invited to sup by 
his side. An embarrassed silence reigned. Made- 
moiselle de Berdons, visibly vexed, but prepared 
with a new tactic, changed the conversation with 


•190 LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 

remarkable surety of toueh. Mauriee would have 
given a fortune to be baek at ^‘The Hermitage/’ 
and assumed sueh an unhappy air that his neigh- 
bor on the right took pity on him and was graeious, 
first with an effort, then of her own free will. They 
talked together till supper ended, studying eaeh 
other, satisfied with each other, divining, perhaps, 
that a day would come when there should be some- 
thing between them less hackneyed than a ball- 
room friendship. Neverthless Maurice was not a 
little astonished when the unknown, immediately 
on rising from the table, took his arm, and, direct- 
ing him to the extremity of the hall where the 
“families” were supping, said in a tired voice: 

“ I wish to present you to my mother, the Mar- 
quise de Montdauphin.” 

The presentation was made ; Maurice invited to 
come and take a cup of tea the very next evening, 
early, and in intimacy. 

“ Well, it is Simone,” thought Clegu^rac. “ How 
beautiful she is ! To love this superb creature — 
be loved by her, and fiy because she is poor ! Is it 
possible?” 

Simone bid C16gu6rac adieu with a sad and 
charming smile, as though she had fathomed his 
very thought. Soon he saw her descending the 
monumental staircase on her mother’s arm. Her 
admirable head, aureoled with a veil of Oriental 
gauze, stood far above the crowd of fashionable 
girls. At the last step she turned, and again her 
eyes met the eyes of Alain’s friend. Then she 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


I9I 

mounted beside the corpulent marquise in a hired 
vehicle, awaiting — should it ever come — the car- 
riage of the king! 

Cleguerac returned home alone on foot ; all alone 
apparently, but was walking in the midst of a troup 
of phantoms who disputed his reverie. Turn by 
turn he saw Irene Oberkorn, Gladys Pauvell, 
Florence Kennedy, Simone de Montdauphin, and 
bolder, more dangerous, more provoking than the 
others, the Countess Gravino, who seemed to hide 
beneath the snows of her superbly modelled figure, 
unknown abysses. True loves, false loves, silly 
loves, hopeless loves, all these vague forms of love, 
danced around him in disorder. He went to sleep 
with this question on his lips : 

'' Must we all love? ” 


XV. 


Maurice had three appointments on the follow- 
ing day : one on business in the morning, one of a 
somewhat uncertain character in the afternoon, one 
of a friendly nature in the evening. He could 
eyen foresee, by the sadness he had surprised in 
Simone de Montdauphin’s eyes, that this third visit 
would bear a great resemblance to a charitable call. 
Unhappily he saw much less clearly what he could 
possibly say to calm or cure this sadness. 

But let every hour bear its own anxiety. Cle- 
guerac had first to talk beet-root and sugar refinery 
with a rich man slightly older than himself, his 
principal backer as regarded money, whom he had 
been not a little surprised, the evening before, to 
meet at the Countess Gravino’s, and still more as- 
tonished to hear addressed as baron. Indeed, with 
his flickering eyes — not for want of frankness, but 
through nervousness — hesitating voice, ill-cut beard, 
and hair too long, Sigismund Versepuis less re- 
sembled a young seigneur than one of those mys- 
terious guests whose inexplicable apparition sug- 
gests the question : 

“What instrument will he play on presently?” 

This young man played on an instrument which 
is the king of all — the keyboard of millions ; and it 
192 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


193 


must be confessed be played exceedingly well. 
The deceased Versepuis, his father, had made a 
gigantic fortune by persuading the Parisians, under 
the Empire, and even under two presidents, that 
a bag of candied fruit or chocolate creams, in order 
to carry weight as a present, ought to come out of 
his shop. This clever man, besides, took the pre- 
caution to put up his products as women of the 
world set out their romances — under cover of a 
pseudonym, so that his own name Versepuis should 
not smell of trade. 

Sigismund, son of the preceding, had inherited 
this fortune, in addition to the inestimable advan- 
tage that he had on the tips of his fingers the name 
and appearance of the fine gentlemen and ladies of 
the various social worlds. He had had occasion to 
hear them and see them, without being seen him- 
self, thanks to an ingeniously-disposed trap, in the 
centre of which, for several years, he had registered 
orders and paid out money. Another circumstance, 
unknown to the public, had marvellously assisted 
him in worldly initiation. The house having un- 
dertaken to cater for the opera buffet, Sigismund, 
naturally, obtained the entry to the public foyer, 
from which by degrees he adventured into the 
green-room, then penetrated to the wings, and at 
last to the dancers’ lobby. There he became the 
idol of the staff, thanks to his fabulous wealth of 
candies, for it was easier to hide the theft of cara- 
mels than that of napoleons. But he made some 
lucky meetings in this choregraphic paradise, 
13 


194 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Always ready to bow, lie never hesitated to reeeive 
a salutation, which might be useful to him after his 
entry into the world, after the sale of the paternal 
stock. By dint of seeing him taking mysterious 
packages out of his pocket, the opera subscribers 
took him for a man of consideration. More than 
one “ protector” wrung his hand, for he was well 
spoken of in the directorial sanctum. 

As for Versepuis, gifted with the memory of a 
recording angel, he knew all the subscribers not 
only by name, but by sight. At need, he could rec- 
ollect what kind of dress they had worn, what friend 
had been in their box on such and such a first 
night. He thus avoided the disadvantage, more 
fatal in Paris than elsewhere, of going about like 
an unknown just tumbled from the moon. His 
weak side was a passion for nobility, a dangerous 
taste, inherited, doubtless, from his father, once the 
steward in a family already celebrated under the 
Valois, who was never tired of saying: 

“You may say what you like. It is only the an- 
cient aristocracy who know how to keep servants 
in their places, turn their back on their creditors, 
deceive their husbands, and ruin their wives, with- 
out hurting their feelings.” 

This preference of Sigismund for the privileged 
classes — reputed so — produced many complications 
in his destiny. The first was the regular acquisition 
and use of the title of baron for himself. The sec- 
ond was a passing intimacy with an old aristocrat, 
who, embarrassed in her circumstances, and quite 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


195 


devoid of delicacy, less easy to satisfy tlian the 
dancers in the old days, was not to he put off with 
caramels. At last, tired of the frail and disingenu- 
ous sex, Sigismund cut out a path in financial en- 
terprises which brought him into contact with not 
quite so charming a nobility, but one in whose com- 
pany it was easier to limit one’s risks. It was thus 
that he formerly became acquainted with Clegue- 
rac, and became one of the largest stockholders in 
“The Hermitage” enterprises. 

Maurice owed him a visit, and paid it, as we are 
about to see, on the day after the Gravino ball. 
The interview started on business points, on which 
Versepuis was certainly a past- master. The expla- 
nations, reports, and figures of the young colonist 
caused him a gentle surprise ; not only was no more 
money demanded, but profits were admitted. 

The interview, under such circumstances, could 
hardly fail to prove agreeable. Sigismund seemed 
to wish to fascinate, and indeed he showed such 
vast experience in industrial questions, so much 
grateful appreciation for Maurice’s many efforts, so 
much discreet personal sympathy for himself, that 
it was easy to see these two men would probably 
become more closely connected. As they were 
about to part, Sigismund said, with a very natural 
air to his visitor : 

“The Countess Gravino gives a lovely party?” 

“ Charming, ” answered Cleguerac. “I doubly 
enjoyed that of last evening; after years of exile, 
I have not lost my capacity of enjoyment,” 


196 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“ The most used-up of mortals would have envied 
you your place at supper,” retorted Versepuis, bow- 
ing his guest out with excessive courtesy. 

It was 5 o’clock when Maurice, with an agreeable 
emotion which reminded him of certain hours of 
youth, crossed the monumental threshold of the 
Hotel Gravino. Thanks to those rapid manoeuvres 
that distinguish well-kept houses, everything had 
reassumed its daily air in the stately, quiet man- 
sion, everybody except the seductive mistress of 
the house. Her beautiful brown hair, hardly fes- 
tooned with a fastener, after the fashion of the 
bather, her eyes voluptuously enlarged by a circle 
of bistre, her tint of hot-house pallor, white almost 
as a gardenia, showed that the fatigue of the ball 
was weighing heavily upon the countess. Mathilde 
was reposing on a long chair in her little salon. 
She was wrapped in a blazing wadded robe of saf- 
fron satin, toned down by beautiful black lace, 
which resembled less a boudoir costume than a ball 
dress. A kimous, whose stuff disappeared beneath 
the amazing draperies, snugly covered her feet. 
In the room breathed the faint odor of those Japa- 
nese pastilles which perfume the air without agitat- 
ing the nerves, though not without a message to 
the senses. The rather large but melting hand 
that now touched his, dwelt on the young man’s 
fingers as on fruit which one detaches from its stalk 
unwittingly, having but touched it. He sat down 
in a low fauteuil, at “ the doctor’s distance, ” judging, 
at first sight, that there was something unexpected 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


197 


in tlie air, without prejudging- whether wise or the 
reverse, but divining that he would shortly have to 
make a choice. Waiting, he regarded Mathilde 
attentively, who, with her eyes on the ceiling, 
seemed to endure the examination without displeas- 
ure, and accept without fear the chances of the 
alternative. 

“Do not imagine,” she said, at last, “that the 
custom of the house is to receive gentlemen as I re- 
ceive you, that is to say, with an entire absence of 
coquetry pushed to the verge of negligence.” 

“O madame !” answered Cldguerac, smiling, 
“ I ask no more. When it pleases you to receive 
me deign to maintain this absence still. I trem- 
ble at the idea of what would happen were you a 
coquette.” 

He spoke, perhaps, more seriously than this in- 
offensive remark inferred. The countess did not 
seem to approve of his reservation, and continued : 

“ Positively, this ball has broken me with fatigue. 
Just now, after my bath, I had not the courage to 
put on my harness. But to leave you at the outer 
door after having sent for you would have made you 
think I am capricious, which is a thing I never was.” 

“.Neither a coquette nor capricious. Nobody can 
say that you abuse your rights.” 

“But I have the reputation of abusing nothing,” 
said she, with a change of attitude that showed 
her sculpturesque lines. 

“Oh, yes; one thing only, the power of your 
beauty.” 


198 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Maurice said no more, but bis fixed gaze showed 
that the spectator was not unworthy of the sight. 
As for Madame Gravino, the fatigue of which she 
had complained had not, we must believe, taken away 
from the magnetism of her gaze. Her black eyes 
and Maurice’s brown ones, equally accustomed to fly 
direct to their quarry, crossed like shining sword- 
blades. Without desiring it, perhaps, the two ad- 
versaries were engaged in a conflict where it was 
difficult to retreat. 

The brusque offensive often succeeds in simi- 
lar cases ; but whether Maurice had forgotten the 
whole out of gallantry upon the prairie, or belonged 
to that refined school that will not win by a sur- 
prise, he remained motionless and silent, showing 
only by a slight trembling of the lips the effect of 
the ordeal. Mathilde was the first to make her 
voice heard. 

must finish by acknowledging a fault,” said 
she. like flattery, from certain mouths. Your 
practical praise has the merit of the unexpected, for 
hardly did you once look into my eyes last night. 
Simone de Montdauphin absorbed you. Fancy me 
reserving you a place at my own table, and you re- 
fusing it! What have you to say for yourself, 
monsieur?” 

“Madame,” answered the clever Cldguerac, “I 
distinguish vaguely that you are speaking to me, 
but I do not understand what you say.” 

“Ah, you are deaf?” asked she, without appear- 
ing offended at the jest. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


199 


“ No, but I am listening to you with my eyes, and 
you tell them things I had not heard for four years. 
Have pity on me ! I am not one of your Parisians. 
At this instant I feel my head as weak as that of 
the poor Indian whom a drink of whiskey deprives 
of his senses, when he will kill, not knowing what 
he does.” 

While Maurice was speaking, the countess had 
drawn in her arms, and was now looking at him 
with her chin on her crossed hands. Near enough 
to the young man now for him to distinguish the 
character of an intaglio she wore, Mathilde replied : 

‘‘ Shall I tell you that you should always mistrust 
a woman’s curiosity — mine in particular? In this 
you make me envy the Sioux woman with a flask 
of rum in her pocket.” 

Heaven preserve us from believing that the beau- 
tiful Mathilde would have continued the metaphor. 
Without doubt she was not devoid of conscience, 
for she interrupted herself with one of those Faust- 
like smiles of which she seemed to have the spe- 
cialty, and, becoming suddenly almost serious, went 
on : 

“ Why not tell you the whole truth ! It was not 
to-day that the idea first came to me of such an 
escapade. If you only knew how many times I 
dreamed of setting off, all alone, traversing the 
ocean, the Canadian forests, the great plains (I 
have studied them upon the maps) , and surprising 
you in your little wooden house, in your cell 
where you sleep on a huge bearskin, in the middle 


200 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


of trophies of lances, tomahawks and bowie-knives. 
You see, I know 'The Hermitage!’ ” 

Such flattery was superlative to a man of C16- 
gu6rac’s peculiarities. During a moment he forgot 
all he held beneath his eyes, and answered, smiling: 

“My excellent friend Lavandien visited 'The 
Hermitage.’ You have doubtless read some of his 
letters, or, perhaps, you are gifted with second 
sight?” 

“No matter!” continued Mathilde. “I know 
all: your fields where the plough can cut straight 
furrows by the hour together, your horses it is nec- 
essary to tame like fabled monsters, your endless 
gallops on the prairie, your manufactory, all — even 
to the blonde Gretchen who adores you, and watches 
you intently on your way each time you pass.” 

Not every day did the seductive countess put 
forth such eloquence. But she knew she was being 
listened to, and in the mystery of her designs she 
had resolved to tempt C16gu6rac by every philtre — 
even that of manly pride. All the same, without 
the least doubt, by a name pronounced at hazard, 
she had shattered and undone her handiwork. 

The fortunate mortal, covered with so many 
favors, now stood silent, occupied in following out, 
far, far away, an image visible alone to him. Dis- 
tinctly he perceived the “Gray House.” Irene’s 
pure and tender eyes were turned upon him, con- 
juring him not to forget, near a rival with so many 
high advantages, the poor little absent sister cher- 
ishing her almost hopeless love. 


love knows no Law. 


201 


The confused impression that he had been upon 
the point of an ungrateful action dominated other 
tumultuous sensations. Besides, Maurice was one 
of those to whom affection, far too easily won, 
seems almost worthless. Already he was able to 
analyze the situation, sign that he was already 
victor in the fray. Mathilde had either counted too 
greatly on her beauty, or on C16guerac’s youth. 

Pretending to misunderstand the countess on the 
nature of the journey she seemed to wish to under- 
take, the prairie colonist closed his eyes to metaphor, 
only acknowledging the meaning of the very words. 
With lowered head he went into the traits and 
manners of the people, gave descriptions of the 
country, of its industrial productions, and its chief 
statistics. Useless to add that he did not pronounce 
Irene’s name, and that he took his leave as soon 
as such a thing was possible. When he was gone 
Mathilde no longer knew what to think, so well 
had he played the part of the simple-minded 
country farmer — at least, toward the end. During 
five minutes she asked herself on what manner of 
man the door had just closed ; timid, impressionable 
beyond measure, very methodic in the art of con- 
versation. All the same, as she was by no means 
shallow, the very simple idea came to her that his 
affections might be occupied elsewhere. 

“ It remains to be seen,” said the countess. “ No 
time, however, has been lost.” With that she 
rang for her maid, and, in a sufficiently ill-humor, 
dressed herself to dine in town. 


202 


LOVE KNOAVS NO LAW. 


At the very hour she was leaving the table on 
the arm of a young officer who seemed to be mak- 
ing him forget his troubles, Clegu6rac kept the third 
and last appointment of the day. 

The Marquise de Montdauphin received the new- 
comer with the satisfaction of a card-player who 
finds she has an execrable hand, and fancies her 
partner holds the critical ace. She was not wanting 
in intelligence, but she made the great mistake of 
thinking she had far more sense than she pos- 
sessed ; or, perhaps, she did not duly estimate the 
wisdom of the rest of the world. In a word, she 
considered everything too easy. 

Heaven knows how it could ever be easy, for 
a widow in straitened circumstances, condemned 
only to receive in strictest intimacy, to marry prop- 
erly a woman like Simone. The marquise, having 
allowed Alain’s attentions during two whole sea- 
sons, thought herself certain of a son-in-law, and 
had let people who deemed she was too gracious to 
the viscount go on talking. She had made arrange- 
ments for frequent conversations with him; she 
judged him sent into the world for the very pur- 
pose she desired him for — a fine young fellow, rich, 
and very capable of love. Unhappily, she had 
never had the opportunity of talking with the fa- 
ther as with the son. A quarter of an hour’s con- 
versation with Count Lavandien — or, still better, 
with the countess — would have enlightened her. 
But when the enlightenment began to come, it was 
too late. Simone certainly was by no means com- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


203 


promised, nevertheless, objection-seekers might 
now name two instead of one : her want of dowry 
and — Alain. 

From the first phrase, Clegu^rac was treated as a 
confidant, which was equivalent to his hearing 
hard truths about his friend. 

“ Fancy, he never even gave you a message for 
my daughter!” cried Madame de Montdauphin 
indignantly. 

Little desirous of taking part in the debate, 
Maurice answered that his cousin could not be 
blamed for showing every caution in an affair of this 
nature. 

“ He did not even charge me with a visit to his 
father,” added he. 

Then the Count Lavandien received the scold- 
ing he deserved. His least crime was treating his 
son with abominable cruelty — an accusation it 
would have been easy to controvert by an exact pict- 
ure of the miseries the exile was enduring in New 
York. One may imagine that Maurice did not say 
much. He began to find the visit exceedingly te- 
dious. Mademoiselle de Montdauphin, who at once 
saw this, made an effort to come out of the reverie 
in which she had been plunged for some minutes. 
She began to converse with- Maurice; they came 
back to the subject of last evening’s meeting — the 
supper and Marie de Berdons. “ I am working 
myself into a great rage with her,” said Clegu6rac. 

“ To think of her leaving me -all the evening with- 
out presenting me to a friend like you.” 


204 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


‘‘ It was I who forbade her,” said Simone, loyally. 

“And may we know the reason why?” 

The blood mounted into the young girl’s cheeks, 
whose transparent skin now paled and blushed by 
turns. 

“I do not know, myself,” said she. “It amused 
me to hear you, to see you, without being known. 
I thought that, on a certain subject, ignorant of my 
name, you would have been more frank. After- 
ward you showed the justice of my calculation.” 

In her fauteuil, near a clear fire, dozed Madame 
de Montdauphin, seeking, by a spasmodic movement 
now and then, to show that she also was taking part 
in the conversation. Regularly, on the morrow of 
a party, she fell off to sleep after dinner. 

“ Do you not find it too hot?” asked Simone. 

As soon as they were seated at the other end of 
the room, close to a table discreetly illuminated by 
an immense rose -colored lace shade, the girl an- 
swered : 

“You will excuse my mother, will you not? 
What does she not try and undertake on my behalf? 
And if we ever were to profit anything ” 

Suddenly, Maurice continuing silent, she said to 
him, turning over an album with distracted fingers : 

“ Do you not think it would be a worthy action 
on the part of a man like yourself to prevent my 
mother ^d me from being held up to public ridi- 
cule ? Why do you hide the truth from me ? What 
are his wishes? His thoughts? What am I to 
expect at his hands?” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


205 


‘‘ His wishes? His thoughts?” replied Cleguerac. 

How am I to answer you ? Do you not know that, 
on certain subjects, it would be impossible to say 
what I could wish to say — to say even what I think 
myself?” 

“Ah,” cried she, looking at him in surprise. 
“ What a difference there is between you two ! But 
it is impossible, after passing weeks with him, that 
you should not know whether or not he loves me. 
All lies in that.” 

“No, mademoiselle. All does not lie in that,” 
answered Maurice, sighing. “ But to come back 
to your question, I am certain Alain loves you — in 
his own way. One must believe that his way so 
far has sufficed you.” 

“ Put yourself in my place. For four years I went 
passionately into society. My mother can keep it 
up no longer. Many young men noticed me, many 
proposed to me. None of them, you can guess 
why, persevered in their enthusiasm. On the con- 
trary, Alain for two years paid attention only to me. 
Never did he lose an opportunity of meeting me. 
We spoke together just as freely as we pleased. 
I studied him as though he were a book. Every 
objection that could possibly be raised, I raised. I 
spoke to him about his father. He answered me, 
^Look at England! Yonder’s a nation of real mar- 
ried people, because they marr)^ for affection.’” 

“ Alain has said the same thing to me, and what 
I was able to see last night of French society 
showed me that the liberty of over-the-channel, be^ 


206 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


tween young men and girls, is in a fair way of accli- 
matization. Alas! mademoiselle, I fear you are 
running up a long misreckoning. The young 
Englishwomen are neither more charming nor more 
worthy of being loved, not in reality, more reason- 
able than yourselves. But their great power lies 
in knowing how to deal with young Englishmen. 
If our brave Lavandien were subject to the queen’s 
will, you would long ago have been separated by 
the Cape, for Australia or the Indies, with Father 
Lavandien ’s blessing, supplemented by bank-notes. 
But in France, in cases like yours, the father does 
not wish to give even a blessing; and the son, on 
his part, aspires to something more than a dozen 
hundred-franc certificates. All the difficulty lies 
in that.” 

“ Be it so,” answered Simone, regarding Maurice 
as though he had been a specimen of an unknown 
type. “ But now, tell me, what am I to do?” 

“ In order to answer well and wisely, I know, as 
yet, too little of you. Do you thoroughly under- 
stand yourself? Lavandien told me that you had 
a plan of going out to join him on the prairie. 
Have you the least idea of what you would have 
undertaken ? Are you sure that there is in Paris a 
young lady of your education, tastes, and habits, 
sufficiently loving, sufficiently beloved, to have a 
chance of not dying of ennui out there of solitude 
and of regret ? See, you have appealed to my candor. 
Well, I am afraid one thing only would be wanting 
at your marriage of love,” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 20/ 

“And that?” cried Simone, flashing her magnifi- 
cent eyes full on C16gu6rac. 

“ Would be love.'" 

“ On whose behalf do you speak? His or mine?” 

“ Let us say, on yours. But it is not your fault. 
To-day everything seems to conduce to the supres- 
sion of love ; education, our manners, the lives we 
lead. On love the drama pours its choicest irony. 
The theatre tells us how Moliere ridiculed the doc- 
tors. Girls would ask nothing better than to love. 
Are they capable of love? Have you ever seen a 
real Chinese woman — one of those whose feet have 
been compressed from infancy? Ask them if they 
are capable of walking. Poor creatures! Not only 
has walking been rendered impossible, but they 
have been persuaded into the belief that it is a vuP 
gar and uncomfortable exercise.” 

Simone, with a singular smile, closed her eyes. 

“Good,” sighed she. “I understand. I am a 
Chinawoman. And, naturally, such a state of be- 
ing is incurable.” 

■ “ Oh, mademoiselle! do not wish the poor China- 
woman some fine day to wake up with an inclina- 
tion for a walk. Unhappy creature — what a mar- 
tyr she -would be!” 

“Well, then, people must not love?” 

Cl^guerac remained some moments without re- 
plying. His elbow on the table, head on hand, 
he had that far-away look so frequent now with 
him, soft, slightly veiled, which seemed a powerful 
charm in contrast with his overflowing energy. All 


208 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


of a sudden his features grew animated and even 
beautiful with ablaze of inspiration, as he answered 
firmly, somewhat sadly too : 

“ No, one must not love, if we imagine happiness 
to lie in the sybarites’ repose, to whom all trouble 
and all effort are unsupportable evils. We must 
not love if spring with the rose will not also bring 
the thorn. But, on the contrary, we may and 
should love, plunging boldly into the infinity and 
the eternity of love, if one is of the race of the 
strong, intrepid enough to achieve life’s supreme 
joy by the inevitable payment of suffering supreme. 
Love embalms, perfumes, and colors life; but it 
makes the heart bleed inwardly. For all this, love 
is the spring, the happiness, the wealth of life. 
The heart that truly loves cherishes its wound, is 
proud of its pain, and blooms again beneath a very 
spray of tears. Love is a more sublime Prometheus 
that has but one fear — of seeing the cruel but be- 
loved vulture vanish!” 

Simone listened without a movement, her head 
slightly thrust out in Clegudrac’s direction. Her 
lips opened wider and wider, her breath grew hur- 
ried as she spoke ; in her brilliant eyes shone the 
confused glow of dawn. As soon as Maurice had 
finished, she waited a few seconds. Then, rising 
with a tired effort, she spoke: 

Do not let us be cruel to my mother, who is 
falling for fatigue. It is time I sent you away. 
But it would be only kind of you to come and see 
me sometimes.” 


XVI. 


“I DID not see you yesterday/’ said the general 
to Maurice, as the young man entered his library, 
on the next day but one to the ball. “ What have 
you been doing with yourself?” 

“Three visits account for my time: To Verse- 
puis, my partner in business. The second, to the 
Countess de Gravino. The last, to the ladies Mont- 
dauphin.” 

“ Fortune, love, and friendship. A well-filled 
day. But, my hero, I have some little trouble in 
allowing you the company of the young man whose 
hand you take before the world.” 

“ Why so ? He is an honest fellow, and sugar 
forms a bond of business between us. I draw mine 
from the earth. Versepuis has grown rich selling 
his at six francs a pound, after buying it at ten 
sous. Do you not think I would do likewise on the 
prairie if I was always sure of clients?” 

“ You know that he has placed his name upon the 
list of suitors for Simone de Montdauphin since 
Lavandien packed his son off to America ? What a 
comical history ! All who play a part in yonder 
little comedy are either silly, blind, or odious peo- 
ple. I hope you are not going to take a dip into it, 
in spite of the frowns the poor marquise doubtless 
showed you.” 


209 


2 lO 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“She did nothing of the kind, I assure you. She 
was far too sleepy for that.” 

“What do you think of her daughter?” 

“She is very handsome, and deserves a better 
husband than Versepuis, I am very certain.” 

“You might add, a better than Alain de Lavan- 
dien.” 

“Their romance, then, is no secret?” 

“ It is the secret of about five hundred of the girl’s 
friends and as many comrades of the young man, not 
to speak of a few hundred of the father’s cronies.” 

“ Poor child ! I pity her very much ; the more so 
as she treats me as a true friend.” 

“ I felicitate you, for the role is a delicate one. 
But, beware of love!” 

“ Alas 1 general, I would give the world to be in 
love.” 

“ In Paris? How about the countess? Did she 
also treat you as a friend, our beautiful Mathilde?” 

Cleguerac glanced rapidly at his visit to the Hotel 
Gravino, The general, who knew his Cleguerac 
too well, was not deceived. 

“ A famous doctor for the malady you fear. A 
headlong woman — incandescent. I have heard her 
compared to those freezing-machines, belching 
flame and smoke from which, at the given moment, 
falls a lovely lump of ice.” 

Maurice accusing him of exaggeration, M. de 
Berdons answered: 

“ This is what comes of passing half the night 
listening to tattle,” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


2 I I 


The young man carried away from this conversa- 
tion a still more lively desire to make himself use- 
ful to Simone, and at the same time the fear that 
the force of circumstances would reduce him to the 
rank of a simple well-wisher. When they met in 
society they spoke together long and earnestly 
with no pretext of dancing. But dancing reunions 
were not common yet, the season having scarcely 
begun. 

Often Cleguerac would come and sit with the 
mother and daughter... after dinner. The marquise 
was not always asleep. Whether she slept or not 
the conversation of the young people was exactly 
the same — serious, gravely friendly, rather sad. 
Rarely did the name of Alain leave their lips. 
Besides, either the young man no longer cor- 
responded, or the Countess Gravino never men-* 
tioned his letters. She never called on the Mont- 
dauphins. As for Maurice, he had gone to pay 
his visit on the regulation-day. Things remained 
in that position. 

It would show scanty knowledge of the beautiful 
Mathilde to say that she was dying of a broken heart. 
An odd remainder of girlish sentimentalism, retain- 
ing bloom and life near the highway by reason of 
growing in a dell, had been sunned into new life by 
Alain’s romantico-heroic letters. She had painted 
to herself a fiery, irresistible Cleguerac, and made 
up her mind to draw him to her feet with all the 
ardor of her sex. But a hero in a black coat is only 
half a hero. This prairie scout, without his great 


212 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


wheel of straw hat and fringed buckskin panta- 
loons, was but a carpet-knight after all. 

But why had he disdained the heart of one who 
turned all heads at sight, if not for long? A flirt 
who prides herself upon the many victories of her 
beauty will not let such a slight pass by without 
an effort to ascertain the cause. 

One day some charitable person said in her hear- 
ing: 

“ It seems Simone has not already history enough. 
This young man from Canada never leaves her 
side.” 

The insinuation was all the more grave, as Simone 
and her mother never breathed a word about the 
new-found friend. The countess took the hint, 
observe'd the eyes .of the accused when she was able 
to ^etithem together; and came to the conclusion 
that there'was ‘^something in it.” Then, a little 
in. spite, a'lTftle By.' reason of the love of noise and 
disturba!nce.that;causes children to throw stones as 
big as they' can lift into the sea, this imprudent 
personage wrote toXavandien. Her letter may be 
thus epitomized: 

People are absolutely infatuated with your cous- 
in. But what an idea to have painted him in all 
your letters as a hero for courage and poetry! 
However that may be, if you still cling to Simone, 
take your precautions. If, on the contrary, you are 
tired of struggling against wind and tide, all goes 
well.” 

Tired of struggling? In point of fact, he was 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


213 


Simone betrothed. But the real struggle was 
not the one he maintained against absence, exile, 
and his father’s implacable will. Temptation had 
swept him up, body and soul, and had taken a name ; 
for he did not doubt that a word would throw Gladys 
and her magnificent fortune into his arms. The 
American was even growing surprised that word 
was so long delayed. On his part, Pauvell, who 
busied himself very little with his daughter’s af- 
fairs, commenced to be uneasy about his own. 
Without acerbity, but with limpid frankness, he 
had informed the young man that it was the custom 
of the house to secure an annual settlement of ac- 
count. A detailed copy of the said account was 
given him. This time the unhappy Alain might 
expect an order to depart to Nova Zembla! 

But let us leave him the vain honor of his jeal- 
ousy and ill-temper. Let us suppose, as he pre- 
tended, that indignation against a friend’s duplic- 
ity, a sweetheart’s treason, dictated the letter he 
wrote Simone — this time direct. Perhaps Made- 
moiselle de Montdauphin possesses that letter still. 
She ought to have kept it in order to reread it at 
those moments of life that demand unusual courage. 
But no: it is better for those who peruse these 
pages, and who may chance to meet certain ex- 
periences too quickly, not to have the opportunity 
of perusing Alain’s prose. 

It was hardly that he forgot, in writing, courtesy, 
good manners, or respect. The worst reproach we 
are able to fix on the letter was that while irre- 


214 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


proacliable in seeming tone and form, it bore within 
it all the calculating implacability of a declaration 
of war. He declared he had learned “ on all sides” 
of the singular intimacy and significant assiduity 
which “ all Paris” was remarking. His being at so 
great a distance, and other circumstances and delays, 
prevented him from asking for a personal explana- 
tion. But he drew the natural conclusions. He 
judged himself forgotten, perhaps replaced. Si- 
lently, without recrimination, as became a gentle- 
man, in future he would hold himself aloof. 

Never did Simone de Montdauphin show this let- 
ter to any but one single human being. She never 
answered it. It was only after several weeks that 
she began to speak about it; where and when, we 
shall shortly see. 

As for the young viscount, he allowed twice the 
necessary time for a reply to pass away; then, one 
fine evening, as he was taking Gladys home from 
a ball, where they had talked together all the even- 
ing, their engagement was arranged. 

The same post that carried the letter to Simone 
as a New Year’s gift brought a letter from Irene 
to Maurice — the first. 

“ Alone with my father, in our poor 'Gray House, ’ 
which, thanks to the snow, is now a white house, 
and with a memory full of you, I have just heard the 
first hour of the New Year sound. That yesterday 
which puts us all face to face with the future, my 
beloved father, with his eyes full of tears, employed 
entirely in talking to me about the future and of 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


215 


you. I know everything now, and why you went 
away. If I were to tell you that I understood cer- 
tain things, it would not be the truth. What crime 
I committed in coming into the world on the right 
bank of a certain stream, whereas I ought to have 
been born upon the other, is a thing that is not very 
clear to me. It does not matter. If it be not a 
crime, it is none the less a misfortune. I am re- 
warded by this certainty. 

“ Naturally, the same reasons that were the cause 
of your departure would cause your return to be- 
come a trial. Friend, come back without fear. 
What frightens you — what is frightening my fa- 
ther? That I was beginning to love you too well — 
and that I was — a very tiresome person? 

“ Well, I repeat, you may return without scruple 
and without apprehension. The two perils I spoke 
about are no longer to be feared. To commence 
with the second, I will never annoy you. This 
word tells all, and you will understand it. Never 
annoy you — never, on the word of Irene von Ober- 
korn. You shall see. Never unhappy any more ; 
less so, in any case, than I am at this hour, so far 
away from you. 

“As to the other danger, it ought not to stop 
you, any more than the one just mentioned. No. 
You need not fear that my heart will be tendered 
where it cannot be accepted ; and I will tell you the 
reason for the first and last time in my life — the 
mischief is done. 

Au revoir^ quite soon, 
i, “ Your best friend, 

" “Irene von Oberkorn.” 

“ P. S. — My father does not know that I am 
writing you this letter. It seems to me this is not 
wrong, and, more than that, is better.” 


2i6 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Maurice answered this “little letter” by these 
simple words : 

“Yes — you are, and always will be, my best 
friend. I did not know before coming away. I 
know it better now that I have revisited Paris, I 
wish to know nothing else. In a few weeks I will 
be with you.” 

The next day the general said to Cl^gu^rac, 
handing him back Irene’s just-read letter: 

“She calls this canticle of a young martyr a Tit- 
tle letter.’ It is simply sublime. Singular creat- 
ures, women. When they give us our life it is a 
natural thing. When they give us a flower it is a 
favor, for which, to the end of our days, we have 
to thank them on our knees. But, with all that, 
my dear friend, I would not wish to be in your 
place.” 


XVII. 


Meanwhile Maurice’s sojourn in the metropolis 
was running on without serious incident, and, in 
truth, his leave, as he called it, was drawing to a 
close without his having effected any of the things 
he came to do. Pleasure and her train glanced off 
him as ink from an oily page. At first frequenting 
society with a sort of frenzy, he withdrew himself 
more and more. Not that he was not treated with 
all favor, but in this very favor he seemed to breathe 
the set benevolence that people extend to the 
stranger on his way, the poor traveller, with whom 
all intimacy of connection would be loss of time. 

The only houses he frequented regularly, almost 
daily, were the Montdauphins’ and the general’s; 
not very gay places, the first especially. Every 
week he beheld this beautiful young girl, whose 
every disappointment and chagrin was open to him, 
growing more pensive and more anxious. What 
could he do to give her back the glory and per- 
fume of life. Nothing. Not even talk to her of 
forgetfulness and resignation. The only thing he 
could attempt was to amuse Simone. It was with 
genuine pleasure that he saw her endeavor to shake 
off, during their interviews, the care that every day 
weighed more and more upon her. 

217 


2i8 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Extraordinary thing ! There were not on the earth 
two women more unlike than Irene and Simone. 
Soon, nevertheless, Maurice was astonished to dis- 
cover the growth between them of certain indefi- 
nite and mysterious sympathies, something like the 
family resemblance seen between sisters, through 
their very dissimilarities. At every instant the 
questions, reflections, silences, even, of Mademoi- 
selle de Montdauphin caused him to return, in 
thought, with an inward shudder to Irene. Some- 
times he would interrupt one of his own sentences, 
thinking he had already said the same thing. In- 
deed, he had said it, but it was in the “ Gray House” 
on the prairie, months before. And, contrary to 
what we might have thought, it was the nearer of 
these two distant ones that started these reverberat- 
ing thoughts. 

Still, speaking to Simone, Clegudrac, without 
knowing it, used to talk with those affectionate in- 
tonations one hardly ever remarked in his inter- 
course with others. On her part, Simone listened 
with a religious confidence, and, when he had 
promised to come in the evening, all kinds of pleas- 
ure parties were inexorably refused. Then, under 
the pretext that her mother was fatigued, Simone 
caused the outer door to be closed, which did not 
prevent the poor marquise tiring herself till mid- 
night. At first she would take part in the conver- 
sation, while her daughter and Maurice exchanged 
the latest items of society. But soon the talk 
glided softly on a certain subject, always the same. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


219 


Clegu6rac, without perceiving it, went on until his 
speech became a monologue. To be only fair, it 
was a pleasure to hear him say how much we ought 
to pity, very often, those who have known a mighty 
love, as we ought to pity, above all, those whose 
lives are ever rendered incomplete by love’s great 
revelations. 

And when, on a certain evening, he avowed that 
he had never known such love himself. Mademoi- 
selle de Montdauphin closed her eyes to hide their 
too vivid gleams. That very evening, embracing 
her daughter as she was going to bed, the marquise 
was dazzled at the shining beauty of her daughter. 

“ Dear child,” thought she, “doubtless they have 
communicated to her good news from over yon- 
der.” 

Another day, when Clegudrac mentioned that his 
departure for America was fixed for the following 
month, Simone had a nervous attack almost resem- 
bling anger. Feeling herself gazed at with sur- 
prise, she cried: 

“ I am not one of those to whom the future is an 
agreeable subject.” 

Some minutes afterward, Maurice, much sad- 
dened, took leave of mother and daughter. 

Mademoiselle de Montdauphin’s eyes were swim- 
ming in tears. 

“Adieu, my only friend!” she sighed. 

These words did not long remain without an ex- 
planation. Sigismund, the very next morning, 
called on Cleguerac, which was an unusual thing on 


220 


LOVE Knows no LAW. 


his part, in spite of the community of interests the 
reader is so well aware of. At first the conversa- 
tion beat about the bushes, Versepuis turning on 
Maurice, from time to time, looks so strange that 
one would have thought he was going out of his 
head, then other looks that seemed to say he was 
going to prove murderous. Successively he es- 
sayed three successive chairs, one of them already 
occupied by his own hat ; he burned the carpet with 
a fusee by means of which he had vainly essayed 
to light his cigarette ; and, finally, with the air of a 
man who is about to present his jaws to the dentist, 
he began : 

“Monsieur, you are the only man in Paris to 
whom I would say what I am going to say. I am 
neither handsome, brilliant, useful, nor celebrated. 
I keep no horses, and understand less than nothing 
of sport. Without illusions, I make use of a title 
because it proves agreeable to me ; the man who 
signed the parchment is still there to tell the tale. 
In a word, there is nothing about me which might 
turn a young woman’s head. But — there is, of 
course, a but — the revenues of my fortune, exclu- 
sively in ready money, mounted up last year to the 
sum of eighty-six thousand livres.” 

“ Let us say a hundred at once,” cried Clegudrac. 
“ My dear sir, you will have to live very economi- 
cally.” 

“ Much less so than you imagine. It costs money 
to enter real society. I have lent money to many 
friends — that is to say, to men who seemed about to 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


221 


be of use to me. Charitable donations take up a 
goodly sum. And New Year’s day presents al- 
most swept away my cash. Besides, there is the 
theatre.” 

“The deuce! If you run after actresses.” 

“Why, there are plenty of spectators. When, 
by chance, some lady speaks at large before me of 
a piece she has not seen, and that is a thing that oc- 
curs with- remarkable frequency, I see that she re- 
ceives the next day, cost what it may, the best box to 
be bought. A box, my dear fellow, a Parisian will 
do anything to get a box.” 

“ This experience is not within the means of all 
the world, my dear baron. But, if you will please 
to inform me, what is to be the subject of our inter- 
view?” 

“ To show you, if I am lucky enough to be able, 
that I am worth more than my appearance. Now, 
I have dreamed a dream — a dream so foolish that I 
never yet told it to a living soul. Probably you 
will laugh. Perhaps you will do more than laugh. 
Perhaps, with a loyal word, you will cause that 
dream to evaporate. For me, monsieur, there is 
only one woman in the world who extends to you 
the most marked confidence. I speak of Mademoi- 
selle de Montdauphin.” 

Cleguerac surveyed Versepuis with an attention 
he had never hitherto given. Once or twice he 
tugged at his slender mustache, then answered : 

“ Dreams of this kind never make me laugh 
when they are told as you have told me yours* 


222 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


But it remains to be ascertained, in the first place, 
if the person you speak of is free.” 

“ She is, at least, in all that concerns a certain vis- 
count. I give you this as a certainty. That young 
man has completely cut the ground from under 
him.” 

“Allow me to say that that is rather a grave 
affirmation in regard to a man well known to be 
one of my friends.” 

“Well, monsieur, we will affirm nothing, since 
the subject seems to displease you. But let us sup- 
pose that Mademoiselle de Montdauphin is free — 
as regards your friend. In your true and loyal nat- 
ure, do you know any reasons, any other reasons to 
advise me to keep my dream within my own poor 
brain?” 

“What do you mean?” 

“ Heavens ! I could never be more than a make- 
shift for a woman of her birth and beauty; and 
thus, if you have any personal motives for believ- 
ing that another suitor occupies the field, it would 
be only kind to tell me — and I would disappear.” 

“ Monsieur, ” said Maurice, who understood him 
at last, “you push your dream rather far. As I 
have had the honor to tell you, I am Alain de La- 
vandien’s friend. I may add that I have been his 
confidant. Among eight answers that I might make 
you, this seems the best.” 

“Then,” said Sigismund, ready to weep with joy, 
“ does it not seem to you that I might be the means 
of repairing one of the cruellest injustices of fate? 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


223 


All, monsieur, when I see other women more richly 
dressed than that adorable creature, I feel like tear- 
ing the robe from off their shoulders. When she 
passes in her hackney carriage I clinch my hands, 
and if I must tell you, it is the hired trap that pre- 
vents me buying one of my own. I should die of 
shame. And to think that a word, one word, would 
be all-sufficient ! May she pronounce it ! All that 
I have I would lay at her feet, to make her beautiful 
and happy. I would become once more the poor 
man, fed, clothed — dare I add — loved by her.” 

Sigismund, as he spoke, grew almost handsome. 
It was, at least, touching to listen to him, and Cle- 
guerac said to him, with one of those warm hand- 
shakes of which he was by no means prodigal : 

“ And still it would have cost Providence noth- 
ing had your name been Alain de Lavandien.” 

“ In good truth, monsieur,” answered Sigismund, 
who was very tenacious of his ideas, “ as for that, 
I had rather my name was Maurice de Cleguerac.” 

Maurice had still time to see the general before 
lunch. Without losing a moment he repaired to 
his house. The door of the well-known library 
was not open, and M. de Berdons exclaimed: 

‘‘ Well, you hardly anticipated this. Your friend 
Lavandien marries the American.” 

The rumor came from the club, one of the well- 
informed ones having laid claim the evening be- 
fore that he knew the Count de Lavandien 's inten- 
tions. 

“But,” said Maurice, “at that very hour I was 


224 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


with the Mesdames de Montdauphin. Neither the 
daugher nor the mother told me of it, which they 
would have done. For I imagine that the viscount 
would have at least infornied them.” 

Mademoiselle de Berdons, called into the council, 
declared that her friend had been no more explicit 
with herself. 

“For the rest,” added she, twisting her handker- 
chief, “ during several weeks she has greatly 
changed. We see each other less.” 

“ Put on your hat, find an escort, and go and see 
her,” decided the old warrior. 

Maurice objected that the move was an impru- 
dent one, for whether the news was true or false 
she was equally unaware of it. 

“Ah, then, you would leave two poor women, 
whose friend you are, to face the storm by them- 
selves. Go yourself and interview the count, since 
this story seems to emanate from him.” 

“We are not on friendly terms on account of his 
son’s stay at ‘The Hermitage.’ He did not return 
my formal visit.” 

“ If Master Alain has capitulated, you need be no 
longer enemies. And, what the dickens, man, he 
cannot eat you!” 

At about 2 o’clock Cleguerac rang the count’s 
bell. Monsieur had gone out, but madame sent 
word that she would see her visitor with pleasure. 

“Hum,” growled Maurice, “it is a pleasure that 
will not include much good-will. Poor Simone’s 
affairs are going very ill. But fortune favors, me 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


225 


in getting me an interview with the lady instead of 
her clown of a husband.” 

With a more extensive acquaintance with both, 
it is probable he would have classed the couple 
very differently. 

The Lavandiens were proud of a well-kept home, 
— a different thing from that rarer kind of home, a 
happy one. For the latter, in reality, innumerable 
conditions are necessary, whereas you may have a 
stylish home that is wanting in almost all else save 
style. 

The countess was pious, cold, and dictatorial. 
The count was lazy, egotistic, always tired. Their 
mutual love of money was a passion eminently fa- 
vorable to keeping up a fashionable home, for it is 
incompatible with most other sentiments. Not 
that they were misers or even unusually stingy. 
They received little, but in the best of style, and 
passed for being rather charitable. As for them- 
selves, their lives were so arranged — physically as 
well as morally — in such a fashion as to defy the 
heat of the sun in August, and the stray current of 
cold air in December. Do you think these pleas- 
ures may be tasted, these virtues practised, on an 
empty pocketbook? 

Maurice, like most pepole, was unaware of the 
important role Madame de Lavandien played in 
her home, for that intelligent lady never, for five- 
and-twenty years, had her husband’s name out of 
her mouth. All rigorous, harsh, or doubtful pro- 
ceedings, everything classed under the heading of 
15 


226 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“acts of proper firmness,” thus passed to the credit 
of the poor count, who was generally reputed as a 
man almost without a heart. From the time when 
she had let the blow fall on her son, the countess 
never missed adding, the operation over : 

“ Now go, and tell your father you will not do so 
and so!” 

Twenty years afterward, so powerful is the force 
of habit of thought, Alain had never set himself 
to ask if it was indeed “ papa” who had opened fire. 
For even stronger reasons this displacement of 
marital responsibility was unsuspected by Clegue- 
rac. 

The countess came to him with outstretched 
hands, a slightly uneasy look, but with a subtle 
smile that said — all that she desired it to say. She 
only pronounced at first the little words : 

“At last!’ 

Then she made Maurice sit down beside her, and, 
as though in explanation of the “at last,” with a 
possible double interpretation, she added : 

“ It was so annoying, this semblance of a quarrel 
between us. But my husband is a bar of steel. 
Poor Alain knows something about that. And to 
think I was not even able to receive news of him 
through your mouth. How did you leave him?” 

“I left him in New York,” said Cleguerac, “in 
the best of bodily and mental condition.” 

The constraint he was putting on himself to 
speak indirectly rendered Maurice very nervous. 
He was hardly master of himself when Madame de 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 22 f 

Lavandien put the following questions, in the most 
natural way : 

“ And what do you think of Miss Pauvell? You 
have seen her?” 

“I have seen her,” answered he, with a look 
which forced the countess to lower her eyes. “She 
is pretty, intelligent, and no more of a flirt than 
the average Fifth Avenue heiress, not more distin- 
guished than the granddaughter of a petty Brook- 
lyn ship-owner might be expected to be. You can 
hardly set it down as a crime in an American to love 
luxury, independence, dress, and violent exercise. 
They have told you, I surmise, she is a Protestant?” 

“The children shall be Catholics,” declared the 
countess, who had recovered her presence of mind. 

“Oh, as to that,” said Clegu^rac, growing more 
excited, “ I do not feel any anxiety. The Pauvells 
would consent to see their grandchildren Israelites, 
Mussulmans, or Buddhists, according to circum- 
stances. But now, madame, allow me to ask if we 
are to believe the rumor that is in circulation?” 

The countess’ eyes assumed the offensive while 
she answered : 

“Nothing is yet official. I suppose, my dear 
cousin, you will not be upon our adversaries’ side, 
if we make up our minds?” 

“ I shall be on the side of justice and of honor. 
Your son pledged his word to Mademoiselle de 
Montdauphin. She is worthy of him, and their 
engagement being more or less known that young 
lady, after a rupture, would be compromised. She 


228 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


has neither father nor brother to stand by her side 
and sustain her. Her only fault is that she is poor. 
If to pity her suffices to constitute me one of your 
enemies, I fear that you will find a host of them. 
Pardon my frankness, but the disposition to take a 
woman’s part is, thank Heaven, still a Frenchman’s 
pride.” 

With the calmness of a player who has but to 
show her cards in order to win, the countess an- 
swered : 

“You threaten me with the opinion of the world. 
Well, cousin, you need not mistake in this world, 
foolish as it is, Calypso’s grot for Ariadne’s rock. 
If you wish to give the young girl the role of the 
lovely weeper, you need not so perfectly console 
her. O Heaven! people doubt all good, all hon- 
or!” Maurice remained immovable a second, sud- 
denly calm, considering this last manoeuvre with a 
sort of admiration mingled with disgust, since he 
understood its cleverness. Accustomed to strug- 
gling without trickery, in the stern warfare with wild 
nature, he felt himself powerless against this com- 
bination of the perfidies of civilization. But above 
all he experienced, with dread discouragement, the 
fear of having contributed, without knowing it, to 
the defeat of the very cause he would have sus- 
tained. At first he tried to oppose such mockery. 

“ This is the first time I have heard that I am 
said to be playing the part of consoler, for which I 
feel myself ill -constituted. Allow me to smile at 
the idea.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 229 

I do allow you, monsieur, all the more so that 
you will be the only one to see anything laughable 
in it — in a little while.” 

“Madame,” said Cleguerac, rising, “till now I 
never thought a human being, man or woman, 
would ever stand in need of consolation for having 
counted on the word of the Viscount de Lavandien. 
You seem to wish me to understand that I am mis- 
taken? It is not for myself I regret my error. 
Mademoiselle de Montdauphin knows, as all the 
world knows, that I shall be on the Atlantic in a 
fortnight. It is, therefore, not / who will console 
her for being abandoned by your son ; but I swear 
to you she would stand in no need of consolation — 
if she thought on one point as I do.” 

“Really?” asked the countess, with a yawn of 
impertinence. 

“ Yes, madame, really. And I pity you for being 
obliged to recognize within yourself that I am right. ” 

At these words he took his leave and went home, 
his conscience not so calm as his looks betokened, 
saying to himself that after all, for a month or 
more, he had perhaps visited the Montdauphins 
rather too often. 

“Well,” he thought, “I need return once only to 
take my leave. It is the best way to allow these 
absurd rumors to subside.” 

In this he was mistaken. On the Parisian ocean, 
as on that of the globe itself, it requires more than 
an hour’s wind to raise the waves, and it is pre- 
cisely when the gale is falling that the sea runs 


230 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


highest. How many worldly intrigues have lasted 
months without being suspected ! In time, in order 
to take flight, love preens his lissome wings. It is 
the very moment when the lovers, passing under 
other laws, perhaps make a detour in order not to 
meet upon the highway, that their names are linked 
in every mouth. Everywhere you meet them to- 
gether! They never leave each other!” 

While Maurice no longer met Mademoiselle de 
Montdauphin in the drawing-rooms now closed by 
the days of Lent, or even called upon her mother, 
the world was persuaded their lives were passed side 
by side. From this it resulted that at the first 
murmur of Alain’s marriage with a rich Ameri- 
can, public opinion was not nearly so much against 
the viscount as Cleguerac had anticipated. Made- 
moiselle de Montdauphin, far from being pitied by 
the men, had a great number against her, not only 
because she had, as society opined, thrown the vis- 
count over, but above all that she had deceived 
him before marriage. Infidelity is villany when it 
precedes the sacrament. 

The young men condemned Simone without ani- 
mus, but without appeal, with the dashing good 
sense that pervades their words and deeds nowa- 
days. They said: 

What is it she wants? To go to America with 
handsome but penniless Cl^gudrac? Better have 
made the voyage — since she was not afraid of it — 
with Lavandien, whose father, so people said, would 
not have left him over there forever. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


231 


Men of the world congratulated the father on his 
luck, with cunning chuckles, and on his clever- 
ness in seizing it. A little more and they would 
have begun to boast that Maurice’s visit was not a 
thing of chance, but expressly arranged to relieve 
the family from its embarrassments. 

As for Sigismund, it was a pleasure to hear him 
talk. Since his explanation with Clegu6rac, sure 
that the field was free in that direction, he had 
worn the pretty Simone’s colors with intrepidity. 

“Of a truth,” said he, “the public is deceived. 
Monsieur le Viscount de Lavandien repudiates his 
engagements; it is his own affair — he wasn’t the 
first to act so. What is a novelty in the case is, 
that the debtor who has let his bill of exchange go 
to protest, insists that the creditor should go into 
the bankruptcy court.” 

Little more was needed to create, in favor of Si- 
mone, a light but steady counter current. If 
Alain’s defenders had counted simply double the 
generations of their nobility (that is to say, two) 
the viscount on his part would not have had so 
compact a party at his back. In spite of all. Count 
de Lavandien had his ears peppered, the price of 
his honor. These latter bits of scandal did not fail 
to reach Versepuis. The young man spoke of 
blood and massacre. Love, hatred, anger, wrought 
his ardor to fever heat, making him almost sublime. 
Maurice, the only one whose tongue was tied amid 
all this noise, had all the trouble in the world to 
calm Simone’s new champion. 


232 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“What! answered Sigismund, “you can remain 
unmoved in face of all these calumnies, all this in- 
justice, in which it seems that all the world is im- 
plicated!” 

“ There is so little coolness left me,” said Clegeu- 
rac, “that I wish I was already far away, being 
only able to do evil with my presence.” 

Madame de Lavandien, during this time, cleverly 
got the mockers on her side with a sentence : 

“ What reassures me is the advent of the saint’s 
days. One must have the confectioners’ truce for 
Easter eggs as well as New Year sweetmeats.” 


XVIII. 


Maurice beheld the arrival of the first day of the 
week in which he was to take his departure. It 
was time to begin his rounds of leave-taking. As 
was his way, he commenced with bidding good-by 
to the dead — that is, to the tomb in Pere-Lachaise, 
where slept his father and mother, lost to him in 
his fifteenth year. 

He had not foreseen that Easter Monday would 
fill the immense cemetery with promenaders, 
either come in grief or for a walk. This crowd at 
first greatly vexed him, for his own visit did not 
seem to him a pilgrimage to an insensible block of 
stone, carrying engraved names dear in other days. 
He came to seek an interview with present, living, 
and clairvoyant spirits. In reality he considered 
the mysterious realm of death not only with di- 
vine serenity of faith, but with the sweet confidence 
that that world of death of ours, though so invisi- 
ble, may still be felt. He did not fear that the in- 
evitable transformation of matter had the power of 
enfeebling either the bond of love or the vigilant 
protection of devoted friendship. He thought the 
dead became, even more than formerly, just, good, 
tender, faithful to reciprocal memories, grateful for 
the pious care of their well-being from beyond the 
233 


234 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


grave. He loved to call them up, to pronounce 
their names aloud in lonely walks; never did he 
feel himself very far away from them. 

The corner of earth where slept his dear ones, 
where, some day, he would himself slumber if the 
prairie did not guard his bones, was situated at the 
base of one of the steepest parts of a burial-hill. 
This picturesque spot had nothing of the odious 
regularity of the ordinary necropolis, for the natural 
irregularities of the ground had defied the survey- 
ors’ level. Each of the sleepers was arranged ac- 
cording to his taste, his fortune, in the precise spot of 
choice. Some contemplated Paris from their proud 
colonnade of sun-illumined marble ; others hid 
themselves between the rocks beneath the mossy 
turf. In that spot there was but slender space re- 
maining, even for the narrow couch of a young 
girl, while a cluster of eglantines served for the 
shelter of a nightingale, who sings there little 
thinking to what thoughtless ears. 

By narrow and abrupt paths, full of artificial 
steps, Maurice attained the great sarcophagus of 
stone, and placed his flowers on it. Then, in a 
sort of waking dream, praying, meditating, evoking 
memory, calling reason to his aid, the young trav- 
eller, ready to leave France anew, passed an entire 
hour, hardly troubled in the least by promenaders 
in this steep and lonely place. 

“ And so,” he thought^ “ I leave my native coun- 
try once again ! When shall I ever see it more ? 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


235 


Shall I come back alone, as I go? What would 
those say who sleep there if, some day, I were to 
kneel at the sacred stone with her? And if, the 
hour at hand, I ask for her, my well-beloved, per- 
mission to sleep in this spot where the shock of 
nations comes but as a summer inland murmur of 
the ocean, would your spirits be offended? Oh, 
say that it would not be so ! Say that it matters 
little to you what the name of this stranger buried 
by your side may be, if, at the end of that name, 
one is able to write that she made your son happy!” 

In the course of but a week or two, after four 
months’ separation, he was about to find himself 
face to face with Irene, without anything between 
them being changed, unless that she had avowed 
her love as hopeless, resigned to all, resolved to 
simply be an ennui to the man she loved. On his 
side he left Paris without having even amused him- 
self in the least, let alone forgotten. Many things 
that he had seen and heard, that he reproached 
himself with doing, remained upon his heart like a 
disgust. And vainly had he asked himself, asked 
others on the part he ought to have taken. Vainly, 
for an hour, he questioned the dead 

At that moment he felt a mysterious mental 
shock. Was it death answering by some inner ora- 
cle, that mingled in his mind this sense of mingled 
peace and sadness? For instead of the fever of 
approaching strife, he felt a sudden calm. Some- 
thing said to him : 

“ Agitate thyself no further : destiny will say the 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


236 

word. Thy spirit seeks but good and duty. It is 
enough ; Heaven will perform the rest. Depart in 
peace!” 

He applied his lips to the stone, now almost 
warm with brilliant sunshine, and went away more 
happy, stronger, still surprised he was not even 
happier. As he was redescending the zig-zag paths 
he perceived that the bronze gate of a mortuary 
chapel stood open. A maid-servant from some good 
family was scrupulously cleaning it. The sight 
was but an ordinary one : Maurice passed by. But 
hardly had he turned the corner of the rock against 
which the monument reposed than he nearly fell 
over a young girl, dressed in mourning, seated on 
a natural bank of moss, and filling with magnifi- 
cent roses a jardiniere that stood near her. 

It was Simone. 

She lifted her eyes at the noise, blushed vividly 
at first, then smiled, with an outburst of joy that 
made her beauty resplendent. 

“Yes, it is I!” cried she, seeing that Maurice 
was still too much surprised to speak. “ Are you 
afraid I am a phantom?” 

“I expected this so little,” he stammered. 

“To find in such a place the girl you called, a 
certain evening, oh, so worldly! Well, you see I 
judge you better. Nothing surprises me less in 
you than to find your heart is faithful to the dead. 
By chance, is it possible that in this city of graves we 
are neighbors?” 

“Near enough,” said he. “My parents sleep 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 237 

above there — beneath that waving tree. I came to 
bid them farewell.” 

“Ah! really, are you soon going away?” 

She said no more, but Maurice read in her eyes 
a well-deserved reproach. 

“I must leave this week,” he answered,” and 
every day I wish to come and see you. But you do 
not know what a deluge of occupations whelms the 
parting guest, when one is going so far and for so 
long!” 

Occupied with her loveliest roses, Simone hardly 
seemed to be listening to Clegeurac. 

“ Since I have known you I try and learn never 
to complain,” she said at last. 

Then, having finally bound her roses with luxu- 
rious blades of grass springing up around her: 

“Would you mind,” she asked, “conducting me 
to them?'' 

Without a word, for the upward path was curved 
and difficult, they accomplished the little journey. 
When they had reached the looked-for tomb. Made- 
moiselle de Montdauphin laid a floral offering side 
by side with Maurice’s, after which she prayed 
upon her knees, her forehead on the marble. When 
she rose her eyes were wet. 

“You lost them long ago?” she asked, sitting at 
the plinth of the mausoleum. 

“ When I was fifteen years of age, with an inter- 
val of a few weeks ; they died of the same illness, 
typhoid fever.” 

“As for me,” said Simone, “I said adieu to my 


238 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


father when I was fourteen. He was the only be- 
ing who really loved me — as one longs to be loved. 
Ah ! yes, kind Heaven, the only, only one. At no 
moment of my life have I understood this consol- 
ing truth so well as I understand it at this hour in 
this cemetery.” 

Cleguerac murmured a few words of encourage- 
ment. With a gesture she expressed that the ef- 
fort would be futile. At the same time she smiled, 
but painful dimples, showing drawn and tense, be- 
trayed the effort. 

“Let us change the subject,” said she soon. 
“ This worldly woman, whom you little know, ex- 
periences the want of putting far away, once for all, 
every semblance of qualities she does not possess. 
Do not imagine that I come here regularly, as I 
ought to do. When the living make me happy I 
forget the dead, to come to them again when I am 
suffering. I have an idea that Pere-Lachaise will 
see me often, now, however. Would you like,” 
added she, after a silence, “ that we should make 
an arrangement?” 

“What kind of arrangement?” 

“If it would be any possible pleasure to you, 
once a week I will come and see your dead. Then, 
in exchange, you will think of me — once a week. 
Is it too much?” 

“Simone,” said he, taking the young girl’s arm 
and warmly pressing it, “ have you already forgot- 
ten our friendly alliance? It is not every week, 
but every day my thoughts will fly to you. Heaven 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


239 


forfend that I should advise you to forget the dead. 
But for a delicate, tender young girl like yourself, 
the marble of a tomb is but a poor place of repose 
in hours of lassitude and sadness. Believe me ; do 
not make too frequent visits here.” 

“Ah!” said she, “if you knew how often I would 
come, yes, often ” She gently struck the mar- 

ble with her open hand. “ This stone will see me 
as I am at this moment, save that I shall be alone y 

Suddenly, without any warning of the crisis, she 
burst out sobbing, while her companion, greatly 
moved by a despair he was unable to understand, 
let the healing tears fall without a syllable. 

As soon as Simone was a little calmer he said : 

“ I conjure you to assure yourself that in me you 
have the best of friends. I leave you happy in the 
leaving — yes, very happy — if I could wipe away the 
poignant image these tears will leave upon my 
memory. Will you not allow me to console you? 
Poor child ! if you open your eyes consolation for 
you will be only too easy. Your heart has been 
deceived ; collect it once again within your breast. 
Have courage. Call to your help your pride. 
Youth ordains that you should, hope, believe, and 
live.” 

She dried her eyes, shrugged her shoulders, and, 
beating the turf with her feet, responded : 

“ Well, then, you fear that the chagrin of being 
separated for ever from Alain de Lavandien will 
shortly bring my casket to this place, covered with 
roses and white lilies?” 


240 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


''No. Heaven be praised!” answered Maurice, 
painfully impressed by such apparently ill-timed 
irony. " But there is a worse thing for a woman 
than being deceived in a lover — it is to go back too 
soon to her error.” 

Mademoiselle de Montdauphin looked Cleguerac 
in the eyes with a sort of passionate anger. 

" One man has no right to reproach me with be- 
ing healed too quickly,” said she. " Can you blame 
me for being neither blind nor deaf? Yes, you 
have convinced me. I was walking on a false road, 
but I was walking in good faith, courageously, hon- 
estly, determined not to fail, even when the end 
seemed ever to draw back and disappear in dark- 
ness. Then you came. You took me by the hand. 
You forced me to turn my head. You made me 
admire, desire life’s real road — that which mounts, 
in the glory of the dazzling sun, to the eternal sum- 
mits . This is your work . And now — is it not so ? — 
the hour sounds for me to drop this guiding hand. 
You are going! I remain alone, with the fatal 
knowledge of what you have taught me, and I 
ought to sit in classic drapery with my chagrin for 
company, at the end of the path leading nowhere. 
I must shed my tears correctly, in view of the 
moved and edified spectators. But, as for me, I 
will not. I am young, beautiful — I wish to suffer. 
But I wish that others should suffer, struggle, make 
sacrifices for me. I want to love and to be truly 
loved by the one that you have caused me thus to 
know.” 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


241 


She interrupted herself, breathless, exhausted, 
transfigured, more magnificently handsome than 
she had ever been — than she would ever be again, 
poor child, at any other moment of her life. Cle- 
guerac admired her in silence. He thought aloud : 

“ How was he able to renounce you without a throb 
of agony, a prayer for pardon, a single word?” 

And now Simone was seized with laughter, dolo- 
rous to hear. 

“ Pardon !” cried she. Why, it is he that ought 
to forgive me ; or, at least, it is thus such things 
are arranged. He wrote me. Do not slander 
him.” 

“Alain wrote you! Why did you conceal the 
fact from me?” 

Mademoiselle de Montdauphin undid her cor- 
sage at the top and drew out an oft-refolded envel- 
ope, putting it, almost forcibly, in Cleguerac’s 
hands. 

“Read it,” cried she, with a bitterness that 
changed her visage. “You are my friend in real- 
ity! You ought to know all your friend’s secrets.” 

And Maurice, at first indignant, then wofully 
moved by the role they had assigned him in this 
miserable comedy, ran through the lines, from one 
end to the other, that accused Simone of having 
given the first place in her heart to another man — 
to wit, Cl^gu^rac. 

“The wretch! said he, giving back the letter. 
“You answered it?” 

Slowly, with trembling hands, she replaced the 
16 


242 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


paper, her eyes drooping on the envelope. She 
murmured, in a voice as soft as turtles calling from 
contiguous trees : 

“ Hardly had I finished the reading of this letter 
than I bounded to my desk to answer. I put an 
empty page before me, I dipped my pen in the ink, 
and thought about what I should write. How long 
this self-interrogation lasted I cannot say. All that 
I know is that, red with shame, happy, very happy 
all the same, I left my table without tracing a line. 
For what I had read was but the naked truth, and 
Simone de Montdauphin, with all her faults and all 
her weaknesses, has never lied.’' 

Long silence reigned. She rested, humbly 
in the fearful attitude of a penitent who comes to 
confess the supreme misdoing of her life. When^ 
at last she raised her eyes, it was to see Cleguerac 
looking at her very, very sadly. At that hour she 
recognized her destiny. With a brusque movement 
she stood up. 

“I am crazed,” said she, with a calmness that 
caused awe at such a moment. “ I should be getting* 
home. My maid will think me lost. Adieu, mon- 
sieur, and may happiness ever be yours!” 

Maurice, troubled to the depths of his nature, 
murmured : 

“ I will go and take leave of madame your mother 
and yourself.” 

Oh, no,” said she, with desperate energy. “ For 
pity’s sake, don’t come. Let us leave each other 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


243 


with this souvenir. The sofas and lustres of a salon 
after the turf and trees of God ! Every-day phrases 
of the world after what you have just heard! An 
au revoir said with the tips of the lips after the 
adieu you carry away! No; I deserve better. Do 
not come, and sometimes think of Pere-Lachaise.” 

Already she was going. Her name, spoken by 
Cleguerac, caused her to turn, obedient as a child. 

“Simone, by your father’s spirit, I conjure you 
to take courage. Of we two, you are the happier. 

If you only knew For you the future stretches, 

wide and pleasant, full of hope. You will be loved. 
Why should you not be loved?” 

“You wish to infer,” said she, “that I may an- 
ticipate the joy of not dying an old maid? Oh, I 
know it!. There is Sigismund, Baron Versepuis. 
I have made a conquest of him. These roses you 
admired came from him. You do not suppose I 
could make the dead so costly an offering out of 
my own pocket?” 

She smiled while pronouncing these words — a 
phantom smile her worst enemy could not have 
seen without profound pity. Suddenly her superb 
visage took on a semblance of sinister disdain. 

“As a matter of fact,” said she, “you know this. 
He has been to you to gain your sympathy. What 
do you think of this rich, disinterested, virtuous 
man who consents to sacrifice his existence to me.” 

“ I think a great deal of good of him,” answered 
Cleguerac. “ I have confidence in him, and I es- 
teem him. Only, for pity’s sake ” 


244 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


Simone had grasped Maurice by the arm. She 
clenched her fingers upon him like a cruel charm- 
ing claw, then said, regarding her interlocutor for 
the last time in the eyes : 

“You esteem him? Well, you may also pity 
him; for it is very probable that I shall marry 
him.” 

Simone walked rapidly away from Maurice past 
the tombs, throwing back as the echo of this threat 
a choked note or two of laughter, probably an irre- 
pressible sob. 


XIX. 


Emotions and incidents generally marcli in 
pairs. On returning home, Maurice found a letter 
from Irene. Although she had shown no sign since 
New Year’s day, she excused herself in this fresh 
letter. 

“ I vow to you that, putting out my lamp a little 
while ago, I had no thought of writing to you. I 
mean by that no more thought than usual. But a 
voice came that wakened me at night, commanding 
me to write to you. The order was sweet — yes, 
very sweet to your little friend ; and yet how I shud- 
dered at the voice! Is it a presentiment? Are 
you ill? Has anything annoying happened to you? 
It seems to me, no. And I feel that you are neither 
ill nor threatened. On the contrary, I know that 
you will soon come back. 

But what am I to write ? This is a thing the 
voice did not tell me. News? Alas! prairie news 

The snow has disappeared, your fields are 

putting on their green uniform to welcome you. 
Not a single horse has run away all the winter. 
All this is already known to you. Yes, it was some- 
thing else the voice ordered me to write. But 
what? Alas! what good does it do to close the 
ears, to pretend ignorance? The voice has re- 
vealed to me that I should write to you exactly 
what I promised never to write to you. Oh! 
wicked voice, but so all-powerful I cannot choose 
245 


246 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


but listen. I must obey. I must write down on 
this paper that I love you with my whole, whole 
heart ; I bless you, and I pray God you may have a 
prosperous voyage, and that you will come back to 
me soon — soon, will you not? And now, I am go- 
ing to sleep again. The voice tells all is well. 
Do not you say that all is not well. What harm 
can your little friend do, who loves only the kind 
Lord, her father, and yourself? 

“Irene.” 

Clegu^rac, without leaving the table where he 
had perused the letter, seized a pen and covered 
several pages, which he tore up instead of sending. 

“It is better not.” These words came from the 
workings of his mind. If some day he was des- 
tined to forget^ at least he wished, out of filial re- 
spect, to remember he trod his native land. With 
a great sigh of anguish he quickly traced a few 
lines that simply announced the date of departure 
as the ensuing Saturday. By the same mail he sent 
orders to “ The Hermitage” to prepare for his ar- 
rival. Then, having dined alone, and very sadly, 
he went to spend his last night at the general’s. 

M. de Berdons, seeing Maurice enter, was struck 
with the fatigue and discouragement that seemed 
suddenly to have made him an older man. At the 
same time he attributed these symptoms, very no- 
ticeable in a man usually so marked by overflowing 
energy, to a cause which certainly was not the 
right one. 

“What a comical fellow you are!” cried the sep- 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 247 

tiiagenarian hero. “ Why this appearance of a raw' 
recruit after his first battle? One would say you 
were afraid to go away. What the deuce ! You are 
not yet at the elevation where the future shows no 
difficulties and no uncertainties. Singular man ! 
When you came to bid me adieu, four years ago, 
the platform was not so high, yet you carried your 
head higher.” 

“The reason was this,” he replied: “the future 
seemed to me a plain ill-lighted, but, at the same 
time, illimitable. To-day I feel like a corralled colt 
without the smallest loophole of escape. I feel my- 
self a victim of the inevitable. Yes, I am afraid to 
return over yonder, precisely because I am too glad 
to get away. Nevertheless I cannot remain. Be- 
sides, Heaven only knows whether I vrould wish to 
do so were it possible. I have seen, in the course of 
four months, too many things that have distressed 
me — nay, saddened me to the soul. To sum all up 
in one sentence, instead of amusing myself I have 
been bored and wearied more than ever before in 
my life.” 

“Does that surprise you? Paris, my dear Mau- 
rice, is only a grand spectacular drawing-room, 
where each, according to his humor, sees played 
out the comedies and tragedies, the coarser farces 
too of real life. When I go to the theatre the 
deuce take me if the most laughable piece makes 
me laugh on the evenings when I feel my bullet. 
Of course, the bullet is always making itself felt at 
the most inopportune moments. You have re- 


248 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


marked something like it in your own case, have 
you not?” 

“ Hum,” groaned Clegudrac, “mine I always feel. 
And even, if I must confess it, more and more as 
time proceeds.” 

“ And you return to the spot where the first gun 
was fired. Poor boy! Go with a blessing, for, 
whatever comes and goes, you have a brave and 
loyal spirit. It is hard to think our parting hand- 
grip will be the last. I am old, and doubtless you 
will not return for a long, long time, if you marry 
over yonder.” 

“ I swear to you, I leave you with your words en- 
graven on my heart. It might be better not? 
What will happen? God must decide. What is 
certain is that the danger is greater here than near 
her. Coming here, I thought to follow the path of 
duty; but Paris, instead of healing, made me worse. 
I compared notes, and when I felt myself lost, stifled 
in this throng of frivolous beings, bereft of ener- 
gies, deprived of faith and courage, I hungered for 
sincerity, generous self-abnegation, true tenderness. 
And now at length, who knows? Perhaps we shall 
find sufficient pleasure in pure friendship to cause 
us to forget the rest. And I will work harder than 
ever. The years will pass away. I am not so far 
from the epoch where one is protected against him- 
self by that best of guardian angels, a head of gray 
hair.” 

“You are greatly unhinged, my poor Clegu^rac!” 
said the general, embracing his young friend 


Love knows no law. 249 

Thereupon Mademoiselle de Berdons, sent for by 
her father, came to receive Maurice’s farewell. 
The talk ran on his voyage and the route. 

You will pass through New York?” said the old 
man. “ This is what puzzles me, I say. How will 
you come to an understandng with your cousin ? If 
you see him, what will you say to him? And if you 
do not see him, what will people say?” 

These observations struck Clegudrac by their 
sense and justice. Without much delay he could 
sail on Tuesday, taking ship for Quebec direct from 
Liverpool. Accustomed to instant decisions, he 
stopped and thought out this little change in his 
projects. 

Marie de Berdons, previously informed of his in- 
tentions, asked: 

“ But suppose they only expect you by the Havre 
liner? The mail has already left.” 

“ I will telegraph from Quebec to Montreal, and 
so on,” cried Clegudrac. 

Shortly after that he left, more moved than he 
wished to appear, for in all France he had no better 
friends than the De Berdons. Left alone with his 
daughter, the general said : 

“ As for you, Marie, you will do me a favor by 
never falling in love with anybody. Do you hear — 
anybody? Love always burns one’s fingers.” 

“Be easy in your mind, papa,” answered she. 
“ It was not for nothing that I am Simone’s intimate 
companion. Let her miseries prove my experience, 
and when it docs happen to me to fall in love ” 


250 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


“Hens will grow molar teeth!” finished the old 
man, amused at Marie’s gesture of disdain. 

“No,” said she, lifting her head. “But I will 
love well'' 

“ So much for my words, ” said the general, shrug- 
ging his shoulders. “Go to bed, you little rogue.” 


XX. 


Toward the close of the enstiingf week Maurice 
was getting off the Oregon^ which had ascended the 
St. Lawrence on its way to Montreal. From the 
docks to the station was but a bound. It seemed 
there was a departing train of the Canadian- Pacific 
in the station ; he was fortunate enough to find a 
vacant sleeping-berth. 

The second day of his journey over the track he 
arrived at Port Arthur, and thought it was time to 
warn his factotum at “The Hermitage’' that they 
might count on his arrival by the train carrying 
the French mail, which, at that hour, was hardly 
starting from New York. He telegraphed his ar- 
rival at the station of Beause jours on the morning 
of the next day but one. Without doubt the times 
were out of joint, for when the train stopped at the 
sign-post of Beause jours, which the previous year 
had witnessed the misfortunes of another traveller, 
the prairie once more offered no visible object to 
the eye — neither trace of equipage nor of pedes- 
trian. A just return of fortune here below! 

Cleguerac, left abandoned with his two valises, 
could not help smiling at the thought that Alain 
was revenged. But, for himself, the innate diffi- 
culties of the situation were by no means so great. 

251 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


He set off on foot, breathing the powerful breath 
of the Great North West with refreshed lungs, 
happy to stretch his legs after the half week passed 
in the rolling prison of the sleeping-car. 

Soon, over the scarce-outlined crest of the hill, 
he made out the more pronounced line of Moose 
Brook, and the little gables, so many times beheld 
in dreams, of the “Gray House.” He drew near — 
nothing had changed. In spite of the freshness of 
the morning, a certain window with white curtains 
was wide open, but no human being was visible. 

“ The imprudent girl,” said the young man. “ It 
is yet very chilly this morning.” 

The too early hour prevented him from knocking 
at Irene’s door. The voyageur passed by with 
slower footsteps, listening for the least noise within 
the house. What a cry of surprise and joy she 
would utter should she see him! What regrets 
that “sister Anne” was not at her post of duty! 
He was nevertheless consoled anew by a sight that 
met him in the belvidere. At the very feet of the 
wooden bench were to be seen a thick bank of 
recently-planted flowers, and this floral tribute 
touched Cleguerac’s heart with a very sweet emo- 
tion, for he knew that they were planted in honor 
of his return. 

To know himself awaited, longed-for! To know 
that somebody is interrogating Heaven on your be- 
half, smiling at calm weather, groaning when the 
slightest wind arises — counting every hour ! O you 
whose appearance some living creature prays for. 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


253 


in order at last to breatli at ease and sleep without 
an anxious dream, take to heart the incomparable 
value of the pure boon of love — that purest, sweet- 
est of all earthly joys. Esteem it at its proper 
value. Ah! if you had heard what Maurice de 
Cleguerac said when he found out, two hours later, 
beneath the little wooden porch upon the well- 
known seat 

And now he hastened his steps anew, desirous 
of finding himself at home, and sending for his 
slender baggage. Already he perceived, far away 
in the valley, on the borders of the snow-swollen 
stream, the laborers preparing the earth to give 
its increase. On the right, on the sloping grass, 
he beheld young colts, too inexperienced yet to 
seek sustenance where Nature provided it. All 
seemed in good order, and the air of prosperity. 
The faithful baron had kept his- promises with vigi- 
lance. 

The young farmer entered his home without hav- 
ing any need to push the door. The entire house, 
by every one of its yawning windows breathed the 
merry sunshine. He felt himself happier than he 
had been for months, almost surprised at a calm 
that seemed to be broken by no worldly murmur. 

Ah!” thought he, “decidedly, I was cut out for 
this life! Heavens, can I struggle against her, 
when in an hour or two I hold her hands in mine ; 
when I behold the blue enchantment of her eyes 
beaming into mine?” 

The chamber was in startling order, Maurice 


254 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


could see that there had been a I'egular clearing 
of the decks,” as the old sailor said. His faithful 
servitor eould not be far awa}^ 

In the kitchen, amid a cheerful clatter of dishes, 
he was singing the song he kept for high festivities 
about the “hoisting of the flag.” 

Maurice ealled Rabat, smiling at the amazement he 
would produce. The blue ribbon of a small pack- 
age was conspicuous upon the table by the side of 
a letter bearing his address, and magnetized his 
attention. Blue ribbons on the prairie ! Without 
a doubt it was one of Irene’s surprises. Ah, what 
a dear and faithful friend ! But what could that 
tangled skein of yellow silk mean that was peeping 
from the paper? 

It was not a skein of silk, but a long easeade of 
golden hair that fell from Cleguerae’s icy fingers. 
His heart convulsed with horrible anguish — which 
was, alas ! not the agony of doubt. Mauriee read 
the letter. It was from Doctor MacAllan. 

“ This time I have not been the strong man of 
the two (wrote the doctor), although I had warn- 
ing, it seems to me, long enough ago. I swear to 
you, nevertheless, I eared for her as I would have 
done for my own daughter. But no single remedy 
this time seemed to do her any good. To tell you 
the solemn truth, the poor ehild died of no known 
malady. I watehed her fall off to sleep, like a tired 
bird, on the night of Easter Monday. 

“ Irene told me all ; she was the most adorable 
little martyr I have ever wept for. All that she 
asked me to do I have religiously done. Here are 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


255 


the curls she promised you. For years my hand 
has never trembled at an operation as it did when 
I ran the cruel scissors across those admirable 
tresses. But she made me swear by all that I held 
sacred. 

“ I do not know your thoughts. The least un- 
kind thing that can happen is a dreadful shock to 
you. I hope that Rabat, according to our arrange- 
ments, has taken certain precautions to break the 
news to you. He will tell you how we buried her 
at the foot of her little belvidere, as she desired. 
A few hours before going away, she sent away her 
father — who will surprise me greatly if he sees 
another New Year’s day — and dictated these words 
for your ears only : 

‘‘ ‘ Passing by my terrace, let my dear friend think 
that “sister Anne” is ever waiting and watching 
for him ; and, when he is not too busy, he will step 
up and pay her a little visit. ’ 

“Alex. MacAllan.” 

Long time did Maurice weep before that altar on 
which blazed the only gold Irene had left behind 
her after her short passage through the world. He 
thought of that letter of adieu she had written, one 
night, roused by that powerful internal voice so 
impossible not to hearken to. Precisely at the hour 
he had read that letter, leaving Simone and the 
graves of Pere-Lachaise, the little German had 
found the sleep that knows no wakening, con- 
tented with having obeyed, and lighter in spirit after 
babbling for the last time — in the midst of so many 
excuses of her simple tale of love. 

Then, without so much as announcing his pres- 


256 


LOVE KNOWS NO LAW. 


ence, Maurice directed his painful dragging foot- 
steps to the terrace where his little friend awaited 
him. He wished that the first word from his 
mouth, that awful morning, should be Irene’s name, 
spoken softly, sadly, despairingly beneath the little 
belvidere. 

Mechanically following the footpath, without per- 
ceiving anything, he remembered that phrase of 
Doctor Mac Allan’s, the previous autumn, which 
now seemed prophetic, since he had known the lost 
one so well, at such an hour repeated with infinite 
pain : 

I can cure all maladies save LOVE.” 



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